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first visible sign that the health care system in Puerto Rico was seriously in trouble was when a steady stream of doctors — more than 3,000 in five years — began to leave the island for more lucrative, less stressful jobs on the mainland…hefty cut to a popular Medicare program and grapples with an alarming shortage of Medicaid funds, its health care system is headed for an all-out crisis, which could further undermine the island’s gutted economy.

owner and operator (Rouzbeh Javaherian) of a Los Angeles pharmacy was sentenced...to 18 months in prison for his role in a fraud scheme involving the Medicare Part D prescription drug program.... In addition to imposing the prison term...ordered ..to pay $644,060 in restitution to Medicare.

National Association of Chain Drug Stores commented this week on the proposed regulations on the use of managed care in Medicaid and in the Children’s Health Insurance Program… create standards that will serve to maintain the strong link between Medicaid patients and community pharmacies and the valuable services that these pharmacies provide… six key areas:

1. Outpatient Drugs…preventing mandatory use of mail-order pharmacies,…preventing a reliance on closed networks for…specialty medications
2. Network Adequacy and Availability of Services – advancing the belief that "patients should be allowed the freedom to select a pharmacy that best fits their personal health needs
3. Program Integrity and Auditing – recognizing the "balance between the need to ensure integrity in the Medicaid program and the need to afford due process and equal protection to providers"
4. Medical Loss Ratio – allowing medication therapy management services to be considered as a healthcare activity, rather than an administrative cost
5. Provider Payment Initiatives – incorporating innovative pharmacy services as part of managed care organizations’ strategies for delivering healthcare services
6. Development of a Medicaid Managed Care Quality Rating System – including appropriate medication-use metrics

Community pharmacists (University of Rhode Island) who expand their roles and make home visits to heart failure patients after hospital discharge can improve outcomes… investigators created a community pharmacist-provided home health service…this program facilitated successful transitions of care, improved medication adherence, and decreased 30-day HF-related (heart failure) hospital readmission rates…

There’s so much for parents to talk about with teens heading off to college for the first time…There’s the safe-sex talk, the nutrition talk, the get-enough-sleep talk, the partying talk and the study-hard talk. In between all the talking and the packing and the planning, teaching kids how to safely self-medicate with over-the-counter preparations for colds, headaches and sore muscles might not be on the parental radar.

How can a pharmacist differentiate between legitimate and illegitimate early narcotic refill requests?…red flag is when patients regularly request early refills for narcotic prescriptions…pharmacists who are repeatedly confronted with early refill requests have a responsibility to say "no" .. those who ignore this issue and repeatedly fill narcotics too soon are being careless with their license and the profession’s reputation.

1. "The doctor wrote it, so I’m supposed to get it."
2. "It was stolen from my home."
3. "I was robbed."
4. "Someone else picked up my meds and took them."
5. "I’m traveling out of state."
6. "The pharmacy miscounted the day’s supply."
7. "The insurance allows it 5 days early."
8. "I’ll just pay cash."
9. "The other pharmacist allows it."
10. "This is for my leg pain."
11. "The other one didn’t work, so I flushed it."
12. "You shorted me pills."
13. "I lost them, dropped them, forgot them at a friend’s house, dog ate them, washed them..."

RediClinic announced…donations totaling $40,000 to eight YMCAs serving the greater Baltimore/Washington D.C., Philadelphia and Seattle areas. RediClinic,.. is making the donation as part of its continued commitment to the health and well-being of the communities they serve… Each YMCA will use the donation to support various programs that will benefit the…children in its communities..

CVS Health has transformed its business model in recent years to give itself a more healthy image. Consumers can no longer buy tobacco products in its stores, and now, they can get health care services at the Minute Clinics　in 860 of its locations. Investors have liked this strategy, and the stock has been on a momentum run-up since October 2011, including a 16.8% gain so far in 2015.

National Association of Boards of Pharmacy …released a progress report urging state and federal regulation for the thousands of websites that illegally distribute medications…These websites can place consumers at risk by distributing dangerous counterfeit drugs,…report recommends that the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers and domain name registrars closely monitor and shut down illegal websites.

New cancer drug cocktails set to reach the market in the next few years will test the limits of premium pricing for life-saving medicines, forcing…fresh market strategies…reluctance …to fund very expensive drugs – even remarkably effective ones – points to a showdown as manufacturers mix and match therapies that harness the immune system to fight tumors.