Today’s Top Story
ACA repeal bill withdrawn; next moves unclear.
The New York Times reports that House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) has withdrawn the American Health Care Act (AHCA) in the face of growing opposition from Republican members of the U.S. House of Representatives. No vote on repeal of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is currently planned. President Trump had previously stated that if the ACHA did not pass today, he would drop efforts to repeal the ACA.
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Other News
Medical organizations request changes to reduce burden on providers of meaningful use, PQRS, and VM.
Healthcare IT News reports that, in a letter to the administrator of the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), 87 medical organizations have asked that agency to take steps to address challenges in meaningful use of electronic health records, the Physician Quality Reporting System (PQRS), and the Value-Based Payment Modifier (VM) program prior to their replacement by the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act, and to minimize penalties assessed for physicians who tried to participate in the programs. The groups recommended that CMS create a new category within the existing hardship exemptions specifically for administrative burdens, and called for hardship exemptions for PQRS and the VM.
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CMS moves to encourage and clarify patient and provider participation in ACOs.
According to Modern Healthcare, CMS is planning a website that it hopes will encourage patient and provider participation in accountable care organizations (ACOs). Under current rules, Medicare patients are generally assigned retroactively to ACOs, so providers don’t know until the end of the year which patients’ care will be judged to determine success in improving quality and reducing cost. The website will allow Medicare beneficiaries to view their enrollment information. If their physician is in an ACO, they would be assigned to both that provider and the ACO in the coming year.
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Study: Injection of multimodal analgesics may reduce pain after femoral fracture surgery.
A study published in the March 15 issue of The Journal of Bone & Joint Surgery suggests that surgical-site injection with a multimodal analgesic cocktail may reduce pain and opioid use following surgical management of femoral fracture. The authors conducted a prospective, randomized, controlled trial of 102 patients who underwent operative intervention for a broad range of femoral fracture patterns and who received either an intraoperative, surgical-site injection into the superficial and deep tissues containing ropivacaine, epinephrine, and morphine, or no injection. Compared to controls, they found that the injection group demonstrated significantly lower visual analog scale scores in the recovery room and at the 4-, 8-, and 12-hour postoperative time points. In addition, the authors noted that opioid consumption was significantly lower in the injection group compared to the control group over the first 8 hours following surgery. They observed no cardiac or central nervous system toxicity secondary to infiltration of the local anesthetic.
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Study: Resistance training linked to increased bone formation in men.
Findings presented in the March issue of the journal Bone suggest that weight-bearing exercise may help promote bone formation in men. The researchers conducted a secondary analysis of previously published data that associated 12 months of resistance training or jump training to increased whole body and lumbar spine bone mineral density (BMD) and increased serum bone formation markers relative to resorption among physically active men with osteopenia of the hip or spine. In the current study, they found that both resistance training and jump training were linked with decreased concentration of sclerostin and increased concentration of insulin-like growth factor 1, while parathyroid hormone concentration remained unchanged.
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Arkansas.
A study published in the April issue of the Journal of the American College of Surgeons finds that implementation of a statewide trauma system in Arkansas was associated with a reduction in preventable mortality and overall taxpayer savings. The research team reviewed records of 672 trauma deaths, 290 of which occurred prior to introduction of the trauma system and 382 of which occurred after. They found that total preventable mortality was reduced from 30 percent of cases pre-trauma system to 16 percent of cases post-trauma system. The research team estimated economic benefits based on a minimal standard estimate of $100,000 value for a life-year, and projected an economic impact of the lives saved of almost $186 million annually—a 9-fold return on investment from the $20 million of annual state funding invested in the trauma system.
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Apply now for the 2017 AAOS/OREF/ORS Clinician Scholar Career Development Program.
March 31 is the last day to submit your application to participate in the Clinician Scholar Career Development Program (CSCDP). The program is a joint project of AAOS, the Orthopaedic Research and Education Foundation (OREF), and the Orthopaedic Research Society (ORS). CSCDP seeks applicants in years PGY2 to PGY5 of orthopaedic residency, fellows, and junior faculty through year 3 who have the potential and desire to become orthopaedic clinician scholars (scientists and investigators). Up to 15 applicants will be selected to participate in the 1.5-day training workshop. The 2017 AAOS/OREF/ORS CSCDP will take place Sept. 21–23, 2017, in Rosemont, Ill. Please submit applications, along with curriculum vitae and a letter of support from your department chair, by 11:59 p.m. CT on March 31, 2017 to csdp@aaos.org.
Learn more and submit your application…
