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Global Health Funding Soars, Boosted By Unprecedented Private Giving
Well-heeled donors, private corporations and average citizens sending money to their favorite charities are changing the landscape of global health funding, according to a new study by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington.

UCLA Scientists Find Molecular Differences Between Embryonic Stem Cells And Reprogrammed Skin Cells
UCLA researchers have found that embryonic stem cells and skin cells reprogrammed into embryonic-like cells have inherent molecular differences, demonstrating for the first time that the two cell types are clearly distinguishable from one another.
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Blood Test Shows Statistically Significant Association With Alzheimer's Disease (AD), May Predict Conversion Of Mild Cognitive Impairment To AD
Dr. Zsuzsanna Nagy of the University of Birmingham presented data from a clinical study, funded by Cytox Limited, demonstrating that a simple blood-based biomarker discriminated between patients with Alzheimer"s disease (AD) and control subjects. The findings were statistically highly significant, and the test discriminated between the two groups with 80% sensitivity and 80% specificity. The results also showed that 40% of the mild cognitive impairment (MCI) patients tested had the same test results as AD patients. Follow up study of MCI patients enrolled in an earlier study found that the test allowed early identification of those MCI patients who later developed dementia. The results were presented at the 2009 Alzheimer"s Association International Conference on Alzheimer"s Disease (ICAD 2009), held in Vienna, Austria.
Endocrinology

Healthcare Costs For U.S. Companies Seen Rising Nine Percent

"Healthcare costs for U.S. businesses are seen rising by 9 percent in 2010, according to a PricewaterhouseCoopers PWC.UL survey, which showed that employers will expect workers to pay more of the bill," Reuters reports. "PwC"s annual "Behind the Numbers: Medical Costs Trends for 2010," released on Thursday, showed that one of the factors driving costs was more workers using health insurance plans if they expected to be laid off. And, it showed that as unemployment rises in the United States, leaving more people uninsured or underinsured, there will be a decline in membership in commercial plans and greater dependence on public programs, such as Medicaid." Of the 500 employers surveyed, 42 percent said they "would increase workers" share of healthcare costs," and 41 percent that they "would increase medical cost sharing through changes to plans." In addition, "more than two-thirds of employers offer wellness and disease management programs, but few said they were very effective at lowering costs." Meanwhile, "costs for healthcare products and services have risen by 9.2 percent in 2009 after rising 9.9 percent in 2008." Jack Rodgers, "managing director in the health policy economics group of PricewaterhouseCoopers," says "The recession is creating a tug of war between upward and downward pressures on medical costsò€¦ With most prices holding steady or falling, health plans will put pressure on providers to hold the line on medical costs" (Ng, 7/13). NPR reports that "more companies are putting health care clinics in the workplace," which some studies show "can cut health care costs by up to 30 percent." Michael Ratcliffe of the consulting firm Fuld and Company "says more than 1,000 U.S. companies have onsite health clinics with doctors, nurses and labs. And many offer 30-minute visits. He estimates that clinics like these will serve 10 to 15 percent of the working population within the next few years." Ted Epperly, president of the American Academy of Family Physicians, points out that most employees still have private doctors, and medical records from job site clinics usually do not "follow patients from place to place" (Toner 7/13). This information was reprinted from kaiserhealthnews.org with kind permission from the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. You can view the entire Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, search the archives and sign up for email delivery at kaiserhealthnews.org. © Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. All rights reserved.


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