New smartphone apps can deliver doctors to your doorstep. Heal is a smartphone app similar to the on-demand car service Uber, but instead of a car, a doctor shows up at your door. Users download the app and then type in a few details such as address and the reason for the visit. After adding […]
The heartburn drug Nexium — whose advertisements have long been ubiquitous on television — was prescribed to 1.5 million Medicare patients in 2013, for a total cost of more than $2.5 billion, the largest amount spent on any drug prescribed through the government program, according to data released by Medicare officials on Thursday. The data was the most […]
Acetaminophen (Tylenol) is widely recommended for the relief of back pain and the pain of knee and hip arthritis. But a systematic review of randomized trials has found that it works no better than a placebo. Australian researchers reviewed three randomized trials that compared acetaminophen with a placebo for the relief of spinal pain, and […]
The Obamacare debate has always been rife with myths, from the infamous “death panels” to the armed IRS agents that would arrest those who don’t buy insurance (really, this was an actual myth). But as the Affordable Care Act turns five, it appears one myth reigns above them all: the idea that the health-care law […]
When Democrats passed the Affordable Care Act in 2010, they knew it wasn’t popular — poll after poll showed pluralities, if not majorities, opposed to the legislation after the bruising national fight that led to its passage. But Democrats had a theory about the law: as time went on, and Americans started to gain coverage, […]
Insurance coverage for mental and physical illness remains unequal despite promises that Obamacare would help level the playing field, mental health advocates and researchers say. A new study by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health found that consumer information on a quarter of the Obamacare plans that researchers examined appeared to go against […]