Category:

Regulators have logged dozens, even hundreds, of complaints against some health providers for violating federal patient privacy law. Warnings are doled out privately, but sanctions are imposed only rarely. Companies say they take privacy seriously...CVS is among hundreds of health providers nationwide that repeatedly violated the federal patient privacy law known as HIPAA between 2011 and 2014...Other well-known repeat offenders include the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, Walgreens, Kaiser Permanente and Walmart...I don’t like the idea of repeat offenders not being called to task for that behavior and I would like to see us doing more in this regard...The number of health information privacy complaints submitted to the Office for Civil Rights within the Department of Health and Human Services has increased dramatically in recent years, in part because of the introduction of an online complaint portal...Using data provided by OCR under the Freedom of Information Act, ProPublica is launching a new tool, HIPAA Helper, which allows users to look up reports of privacy violations by provider for the first time. OCR’s material often referred to the same entities by multiple names. CVS was listed as “CVS,” “Pharmacy, CVS,” “Caremark, CVS,” “CVS Caremark”...We have standardized organizations’ names to make searching easier.

Drug Enforcement Administration...relaxed some restrictions on research evaluating cannabidiol, an extract of the marijuana plant, for medicinal use...The modifications will ease some requirements imposed by the Controlled Substances Act on possession of cannabidiol (CBD) for a specific Food and Drug Administration approved research protocol...researchers who expanded the scope of their studies and required more CBD than initially approved had to request, in writing... the changes...a previously registered CBD clinical researcher who is granted a waiver can readily modify the protocol and continue research seamlessly. (waiver effectively removes a step from the approval process)...A handful of companies are developing cannabis-derived drugs. Pioneering the effort is Britain's GW Pharmaceuticals, which is slated next year to deliver the results of four late-stage U.S. studies of its botanical pot-based epilepsy treatment...INSYS Therapeutics Inc and Zynerba Pharmaceuticals Inc are working on much earlier stages of development with synthetic cannabis for a number of disorders.

Victor Hurtado, 21, of Albuquerque, N.M., was sentenced...in federal court to 141 months in federal prison for his conviction...arising out of a pharmacy robbery...Hurtado will be on supervised release for five years after completing his prison sentence...The indictment...alleged...

• violated the Hobbs Act by interfering with interstate commerce by robbery and violence;
• brandished a firearm during a crime of violence;
• violated the Controlled Substance Registrant Act by robbery involving controlled substance;
• violated the Safe Doses Act by theft of medical products; and
• possessed Oxycodone with intent to distribute.

The charges...arose from...armed robbery of the Smith’s Pharmacy...Albuquerque...Hurtado...jumped over the counter while brandishing a firearm, and ordered the pharmacist to open the safe where controlled substances were kept...admitted pointing the firearm at the pharmacy employees to gain their compliance, and stealing bottles of Oxycodone and other drugs from the pharmacy’s inventory.

The massive Pfizer-Allergan merger is getting a lot of attention. It is one of the largest takeovers ever in the healthcare industry, worth an estimated $160 billion…But consider another number: The amount Pfizer, Allergan and their predecessor companies have paid to settle government healthcare fraud allegations in the US – a total of nearly $4.5 billion. That total doesn’t include close to $1 billion paid to settle related consumer actions…Add to that the six criminal pleas and four corporate integrity agreements that the companies and their predecessor subsidiaries have agreed to, and one might question whether cheating and corruption are part of their “corporate DNA.”… The duo’s “hall of shame” is staggering and impossible to overlook. Here are some of the settlements the two corporations and/or their predecessor companies have paid the US and states:

•     Pfizer/Parke Davis/Warner Lambert — $430 million settlement and a criminal plea. (2004)
•     Pfizer/Pharmacia & Upjohn Co. — $2.3 billion and a criminal plea. (2009)
•     Allergan — $600 million and a criminal plea. (2010)
•     (Allergan/Actavis) Forest Labs — $313 million and a criminal plea. (2010)
•     Pfizer — $14.5 million. (2011)
•     (Allergan/Actavis) Watson Pharmaceuticals — $1.7 million. (2012)
•     Pfizer/Wyeth Pharmaceuticals — $491 million and a criminal plea. (2013)
•     Allergan/Actavis/Watson Pharmaceuticals — $12.4 million. (2013)
•     Pfizer/Wyeth — $35 million. (2014)
•     Allergan/Warner Chilcott — $125 million and a criminal plea. (2015)

They’re the new Brink’s trucks...Delivery vans that transport prescription painkillers from warehouses to pharmacies and hospitals are the targets of an escalating number of thefts across the country...Amid a nationwide epidemic of opioid addiction, the delivery vans have become an appealing and vulnerable target for thieves, addicts, and drug dealers...Hitting the right pharmaceutical courier can yield a payoff similar to robbing an armored car. But the pharmaceutical van drivers usually receive little security training, work alone, and rarely carry weapons...“We still have a segment of criminals that very much want to get their hands on those pills because they have high street value,”...“People are willing to go to extreme means to get those pills.”...Three wholesalers, with combined revenues of over $300 billion, dominate the US pharmaceutical market. All three declined to answer specific questions about how often couriers delivering their products are robbed, any security measures undertaken in recent years, and their reliance on independent contract drivers to deliver their goods...Cardinal Health said the company maintains “robust safety measures to ensure the safe distribution of products.”...McKesson Corporation said it would not answer questions for “security reasons.” AmerisourceBergen...did not provide responses to questions.

Martin Shkreli Says Drug-Price Hikes Led to Arrest

KaloBios Says Martin Shkreli Terminated as CEO

Fired by KaloBios, a chastened Martin Shkreli claims bad boy persona was just an 'experiment'

Martin Shkreli’s social media accounts hacked, posting vulgar messages days after his arrest

Martin Shkreli's co-defendant gets to go to Cancun on vacation

Who is Martin Shkreli? A timeline

Martin Shkreli Live Stream

More than 720 data breaches occurred this year, and the top seven cyberattacks alone have left more than 193 million personal records open to fraud and identity theft...Of the seven, the healthcare industry has the dubious honor of three top spots, with the Anthem breach leading the pack...Our research indicates that cybercriminals are increasingly going after targets in the medical and healthcare verticals, which store valuable patient data that can't be reissued like a credit card...Each of the top seven data breaches compromised more than 5 million records, indicating that attackers are becoming stealthier, are employing more sophisticated techniques and are going after bigger and more lucrative targets...The top 7 breaches:

1. Excellus BlueCross BlueShield
2. Premera Blue Cross
3. Vtech
4. Experian/T-Mobile
5. OPM
6. Ashley Madison
7. Anthem

State officials have been cracking down on Florida’s "pill mills" over the past five year to prevent pain clinics from dispensing large quantities of prescription opioids to residents without following proper protocol–and their efforts seem to be paying off...a new study revealed that approximately 1,029 fewer people in Florida lost their lives to prescription opioid-related overdoses over a 34-month period than would have had the Sunshine State not targeted pill mills beginning in 2010...State officials passed new laws in 2010 and 2011 to curb opioid abuse, misuse and overdose in the state by establishing greater oversight over pain clinics. "These laws prohibited ​on-site dispensing of most prescription narcotics, prohibited advertising and increased criminal penalties for doctors and clinic owners involved drug diversion,"..."In addition, state and local law enforcement collaborated with the DEA to enforce these new laws, arresting pill mill owners, physicians and other staff, and seizing assets."...The study’s authors believe Floridians are less likely to become addicted to heroin because people are less likely to abuse prescription opioids, mainly due to the fact that they aren’t readily available in the state.

Martin Shkreli...was arrested by the FBI...after a federal investigation involving his former hedge fund and a pharmaceutical company he previously headed...The securities fraud probe of Shkreli, who is now chief executive officer of Turing Pharmaceuticals and KaloBios Pharmaceuticals, stems from his time as manager of hedge fund MSMB Capital Management and CEO of biopharmaceutical company Retrophin...SEC alleged that Shkreli engaged in "widespread fraudulent conduct" from at least October 2009 to March 2014... "made material misrepresentations and omissions to investors and prospective investors,"...once Shkreli took Retrophin public, he "fraudulently induced" the company to fund settlements with individuals who had claims against Shkreli from their investments in his hedge funds...

Four people (Dr. Michael Kelly, Priscilla Orosco, Joyce James, Tamara Mitchell) have been charged in a $17 million health insurance fraud scheme involving the sale of ketamine to patients without a valid prescription…The four-count indictment alleges Mitchell was an owner of two pharmacies, Diamond and Save Rite, that sold controlled substances as part of a marketing scheme, rather than for legitimate medical need. Diamond Pharmacy and Save Rite almost exclusively sold compounded creams containing prescription drugs and ketamine to the public by using pre-signed prescriptions to fill orders for customers, who had the “right” insurance plans, according to the charges…Mitchell allegedly hired pharmacy technician Orosco and pharmacist James to conduct the day-to-day operations of the business…Diamond Pharmacy paid (Dr.) Kelly thousands of dollars per month to provide pre-signed prescriptions without examining patients. Diamond and Save Rite (pharmacies) then allegedly billed insurance companies for compounded creams containing controlled substances…the four…face up to 20 years in federal prison and a possible $250,000 maximum fine. They also face another 10 years for both the conspiracy to distribute and for aiding the distribution of Ketamine as well as a possible $500,000 fine.