MDedge Hematology and Oncology

2 days ago | mdedge.com | Alicia Ault

WASHINGTON — Food and Drug Administration officials said they have started several new initiatives in response to the Institute of Medicine's call to overhaul drug safety efforts. The projects, including one to more closely monitor the postmarketing safety of four new molecular entities and a plan to put more postmarketing data on the agency's Web site, were revealed at a meeting sponsored by the IOM.

2 days ago | mdedge.com | Alicia Ault

CMS Extends Form DeadlineThe Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has extended the deadline for filing Medicare claims using its new version of claims form CMS-1500, because of formatting errors on the revised form, CMS announced. The original deadline for switching to the new form—known as CMS-1500 (08/05)—originally was April 2. But CMS said last month that contractors have been directed to continue to accept the old form until the agency notifies them to stop.

2 days ago | mdedge.com | Alicia Ault

Vytorin Marketing InvestigatedMerck and Schering-Plough's problems with Vytorin are continuing. The companies had already disclosed that marketing of the cholesterol-lowering drug was being investigated by the New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut attorneys general. Now, in its third-quarter filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Merck says that it has received inquiries from 35 state attorneys general looking into whether Vytorin marketing violated state consumer protection laws.

1 week ago | mdedge.com | Batya Swift Yasgur

Older adults may have a high degree of suicidal intent yet still have low scores on scales measuring psychiatric symptoms, such as depression, new research suggests. In a cross-sectional cohort study of more than 800 adults who presented with self-harm to psychiatric emergency departments in Sweden, participants aged 65 years and older scored higher than younger and middle-aged adults on measures of suicidal intent.

1 week ago | mdedge.com | Alicia Ault

FROM NATURE MENTAL HEALTHA large 20-year study — the longest and most detailed of its kind — shows that posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms can endure for decades, challenging conventional timelines for recovery and offering new insights to guide future treatment.