This week in the medical journals
CNN - Researchers from Kaiser Permanente in Oakland said that putting a $1,000 limit on prescription drug coverage for Medicare patients added up to more hospitalizations, more emergency room visits, less adherence to recommended drug therapy for high

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El Paso Times - Has a record of promoting prescription drug coverage for elderly and expanded insurance for children, but not universal coverage. Immigration: Voted for 2006 bill offering legal status to illegal immigrants subject to conditions including English

State may give insured more time to upgrade
Boston Online - The staff’s recommendation to press ahead with requiring drug coverage resulted from the strong feeling “that drugs have become so important to medical care that it seems anachronistic to exclude them,” Kingsdale said . The staff is working on

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Wausau Daily Herald - If it isn’t extended, it will leave more than 110,000 seniors — including more than 7,800 from Lincoln, Marathon, Portage and Wood counties — in search of Medicare Part D plans to obtain prescription drug coverage or purchase private coverage

Capitol Hill Watch
Kaisernetwork.org - The bill also would repeal Medicare language enacted last year that allows limited continuous enrollment in Medicare Advantage plans without prescription drug coverage but does not allow beneficiaries to end participation in Medicare Advantage plans

Week of: February 25
Boston Online - This morning, the Affordable Care Today Coalition will pressed for inclusion of prescription drug coverage, trotting out Harvard researchers and other speakers at a State House news conference to insist that payment for medicines is essential to good

Glaxo breast cancer pill wins FDA approval
Easy Bourse - Infused cancer drugs are covered under Medicare, but not pills, which fall under the program’s voluntary prescription drug coverage plans. A Glaxo spokeswoman said it will give Tykerb free to patients with incomes at or below 500 percent of the

Filed under: Health Plan