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Nicole Grassano, PTNN, Pharmacy Week in Review, this weekly video program provides our readers with an in-depth review of the latest news, product approvals, FDA rulings and more.

Two new reports quantify the problem that community pharmacists have experienced firsthand: direct and indirect remuneration fees are skyrocketing, causing some pharmacies to go out of business...DIR fees have skyrocketed by 1600% in the last 5 years, totaling $8.5 billion since 2013, according to a new policy analysis...Pharmacy benefit managers are profiting from DIR fees in excess of 500% per prescription, compared with the average PBM administration fee...A loophole in the program allows health plans and PBMs to pocket an excessive amount of pharmacy DIR fees rather than offset prescription costs for seniors...READ MORE

A project that began in 2016 through a partnership with Renown Health and the Desert Research Institute, Healthy Nevada has gained national attention for its approach to population health. The study involves harvesting DNA from a significant population, providing individuals with information on their health risks as well data to study population health issues and concerns. According to Dr. Anthony Slonim, president and CEO of Renown Health...“We hope to improve the health of the community,” explained Slonim. “We hope to provide individuals with improved understanding of their health and their healthcare risks so they can change their behavior. And, we hope that we can make our community, our state and, potentially, our nation healthier as a result of this data.”...READ MORE

The 2019 novel coronavirus, named 2019-nCoV, continues to dominate headlines as more cases emerge in the United States. As of February 5, the CDC has confirmed 11 positive tests of the virus in US patients...READ MORE

Here is a roundup of the latest coronavirus-related news:

1. Pharmacists are running short on surgical masks due to coronavirus fears, according to a new survey.
2. FDA issues emergency use authorization (EUA) for the first 2019-nCoV diagnostic.
3. Gilead Sciences is donating its experimental antiviral drug remdesivir for clinical trials involving patients with coronavirus in China.
4. Department of Health and Human Services will collaborate with Regeneron to develop treatment.

Pharmacists remain at the top of the Gallup’s annual survey of professionals that rank the highest in “honesty and ethics”...For the 18th year in a row, nurses ranked as the most trusted professionals, as 85% of Americans say their honesty and ethical standards are "very high" or “high”. Engineers placed second at 66%, followed by medical doctors (65%), and pharmacists (64%)...“Medical professions in general rate highly in Americans' assessments of honesty and ethics, with at least 6 in 10 US adults saying medical doctors, pharmacists, and dentists have high levels of these virtues,”...READ MORE

Christina Mattina, welcome to This Week in Managed Care from the Managed Markets News Network

NACDS is welcoming “the strongest signal yet” by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services that a standardized pharmacy quality program should be created...In a new proposed rule, CMS proposed taking action to increase transparency in Medicare Part D plan sponsors’ pharmacy performance measures, NACDS said in a press release Plan sponsors would have to disclose these measures and CMS would publish them, according to the proposal...The CMS rule also recommends principles to guide pharmacy performance measures, urges the industry to work together toward appropriate measures, and indicates the possibility that CMS may incent plans to use appropriate quality measures, NACDS said...READ MORE

The surge in vertical integration in the healthcare industry has created "an oligopoly of integrated healthcare companies controlling nearly all aspects of the healthcare and pharmacy supply chain," said the National Community Pharmacists Association in comments submitted today to the Federal Trade Commission and the US Department of Justice Antitrust Division..."These vertical mergers have allowed a handful of massive companies to exercise enormous power over patients and the marketplace. In many cases, we believe they are creating for themselves unfair advantages that are driving up patient costs and killing local businesses," said B. Douglas Hoey, NCPA CEO...READ MORE

Nicole Grassano, PTNN, Pharmacy Week in Review, this weekly video program provides our readers with an in-depth review of the latest news, product approvals, FDA rulings and more.

The top 1% of opioid prescribers in the U.S. are responsible for 49% of all opioid doses and 27% of all prescriptions, according to a study that suggests efforts to combat overuse of prescription painkillers should concentrate on these heavy prescribers...“We did not know that opioid prescribing was so extraordinarily concentrated in the U.S., well beyond what we see for other medications,”...our study also showed that most U.S. physicians are now prescribing consistent with guidelines (Guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention),” Humphreys said by email. “Taken together, these findings suggest that safer prescribing initiatives can be much more focused on the most prolific prescribers.”...READ MORE