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Barriers to adoption include hearing issues, lack of tech abilities and visual difficulties...While telemedicine may be having a boom, a new study published in JAMA warns that it may not be suitable for everyone...The study, which looked at data from adults over the age of 65, found that over a third of people weren’t ready for video visits...“Although many older adults are willing and able to learn to use telemedicine, an equitable health system should recognize that for some, such as those with dementia and social isolation, in-person visits are already difficult and telemedicine may be impossible,” authors of the study wrote. “For these patients, clinics and geriatric models of care such as home visits are essential.”...READ MORE

A new patented process for delivering specialty medicine will assure AllianceRx Walgreens Prime patients receive their medicine delivered at the correct temperature...It is the only specialty pharmacy to offer a patented cold-chain shipment packaging process...Maintaining the right temperatures is critical to ensuring the efficacy of specialty medications, including costly biologics and injectables, which have special storage or temperature requirements...The new patented process also reduces waste and eliminates reship needs...AllianceRx Walgreens Prime anticipates a significant annual savings in reship costs...READ MORE

Never before have prospective vaccines for a pathogen entered final-stage clinical trials as rapidly as candidates for Covid-19...The colossal impact of the coronavirus is motivating the speed, opening a spigot of funding and inspiring research teams around the world to join the hunt. But the astonishing pace of the progress is also a consequence of the virus itself: It is, scientifically speaking, an easier target for potential vaccines than other pathogens, and a prime candidate for cutting-edge vaccine platforms new to scientists’ toolkits...Vaccines typically take years, if not decades, to reach people; the record now is four years for the mumps vaccine. Here’s what has propelled the Covid-19 endeavor to eclipse prior efforts so far...READ MORE
A familiar family
An acute, not chronic infection
Cutting-edge approaches
Money, money, money
Regulatory nimbleness
The challenges ahead

...Western intelligence officials pegged Russian hackers with an attempt to rip off leading research for a COVID-19 vaccine, linking the would-be thieves with the country's intelligence services...Russia itself denies involvement in any of those attacks—and with a new licensing deal for AstraZeneca's COVID-19 shot, the country says it doesn't need the secrets anyway...Russian drugmaker R-Pharm has signed a licensing deal with Britain's AstraZeneca to produce and distribute doses of its University of Oxford-partnered adenovirus-based COVID-19 shot, AZD1222...READ MORE

Hospital executive minds have understandably been distracted since the start of 2020, but the impact of the emergence of SarsCoV2 has not been limited to its physical toll. It has also torn into data security defenses and exposed patient privacy...The word ‘unprecedented’ seems to have been used on a daily basis during the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly when it comes to the impact of the virus on patients, clinicians, resources and care delivery. But it has resonated equally strongly with hospital chief information security officers, with its power to either stiffen resolve or ratchet up already stretched nervous tension as data security faces a whole new scale and level of cyber threats...READ MORE

As Covid-19 drives many patients away from in-person care and toward virtual visits, experts warn that the nation’s most vulnerable members may be shut out of the booming telehealth business...Federal policymakers temporarily relaxed regulations to make it easier to provide virtual care during the pandemic, fueling a shift toward telemedicine that has become so popular among patients and providers that there are now a number of proposals to make the changes permanent. Just this week, President Trump signed an executive order that would permanently extend some of those policies...But a pair of new studies published this week show that there are barriers to virtual visits that regulatory changes alone can’t fix...READ MORE

Chinese government-linked hackers targeted biotech company Moderna Inc... earlier this year in a bid to steal valuable data...the U.S. Justice Department made public an indictment of two Chinese nationals accused of spying on the United States, including three unnamed U.S.-based targets involved in medical research to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. The indictment states the Chinese hackers “conducted reconnaissance” against the computer network of a Massachusetts biotech firm known to be working on a coronavirus vaccine in January...READ MORE

Washington, Oregon, Nevada and Colorado will share best practices for telehealth and remote patient monitoring, and follow their own state policies while also adhering to seven key principles, their governors say...Given their states' "significant individual and collective experience with telehealth," the governors say they'll work together to help "ensure that the nation benefits from our knowledge as changes to federal regulations are contemplated, to support continued application and availability of telehealth in our states, and to ensure that we address the inequities faced in particular by tribal communities and communities of color."...READ MORE
Access
Confidentiality
Equity
Standard-of-care requirements
Stewardship
Patient choice
Payment and reimbursement

The Trump administration is taking steps to give telehealth a broader role under Medicare, with an executive order that serves as a call for Congress to make doctor visits via personal technology a permanent fixture of the program...The order President Donald Trump signed...applies to one segment of Medicare recipients — people living in rural communities. But administration officials said it’s intended as a signal to Congress that Trump is ready to back significant legislation that would permanently open up telehealth as an option for all people with Medicare...READ MORE

Leading health IT groups are criticizing the Trump administration's move to abruptly change how hospitals report COVID-19 data, saying it jeopardizes public trust and hampers the industry's ability to respond to the pandemic...the Trump administration directed hospitals to sidestep the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and send critical information about COVID-19 hospitalizations and equipment to a different federal database set up by the Department of Health and Human Services...The American Medical Informatics Association and the American College of Medical Informatics wrote an open letter claiming this shift in reporting will create data gaps, "hindering efforts to recognize, understand, and evaluate important trends related to COVID-19."...READ MORE