Promoting patient safety and improving the quality of patient care
Category: Blood Clots
The month of March is blood clot awareness month. According to the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention):
Anyone can be affected by a blood clot regardless of age, gender, or race. This Blood Clot Awareness Month, learn the signs and symptoms of a blood clot and find free resources to share with friends, family, and colleagues to help raise awareness about blood clots.
By Michael Wong, JD (Founder & Executive Director, Physician-Patient Alliance for Health & Safety)
In observance of Blood Clot Awareness Month, this article is not about 10 things or 7 ways or even 3 methods for preventing blood clots. I thought that I would make it super easy by distilling what needs to be done to just 1.
Every 6 minutes in the US, someone dies from a blood clot!
By Michael Wong, JD (Founder & Executive Director, Physician-Patient Alliance for Health & Safety)
This is the question that I recently asked myself – “Has WellCare Put Profits Before Patients?”
In a letter to Ken Yamaguchi, MD, MBA (Executive Vice President, Chief Medical Officer WellCare Prescription Insurance, Inc.), the Partnership to Advance Cardiovascular Health (together with a coalition of concerned organizations, including the Physician-Patient Alliance for Health & Safety) ask Dr. Yamaguchi about a pricing decision WellCare made for seniors that will increase the price of a drug by five times what they had previously paid:
recent formulary change that will drastically increase the price of apixaban for Medicare Part D WellCare participants. By placing apixaban on a higher formulary tier, medically fragile seniors will pay five times as much for their life-saving direct oral anticoagulant (DOAC).
Continue reading “Has WellCare Put Profits Before Patients?”
Atrial Fibrillation (also known as “AF” or “Afib”) is a common heart arrhythmia. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that 12.1 million people in the United States will have AFib in 2030, saying:
More than 454,000 hospitalizations with AFib as the primary diagnosis happen each year in the United States. The condition contributes to about 158,000 deaths each year. The death rate from AFib as the primary or a contributing cause of death has been rising for more than two decades.
To help save lives and reduce the incidence of Afib-related deaths, Brittney Harrell, a legislative law clerk in San Francisco who has a passion for design and patient safety, designed this infographic describing 6 myths about atrial fibrillation.
Continue reading “Infographic – 6 Myths About Atrial Fibrillation”
By Michael Wong, JD (Founder & Executive Director, Physician-Patient Alliance for Health & Safety)
CDC estimates that almost one million Americans suffer from venous thromboembolism (VTE), also known as blood clots. VTE is a term that is comprised of two medical conditions deep vein thrombosis (DVT), which is a blood clot in one or more of the deep veins in the body, usually in the legs, and pulmonary embolism (PE), which is a blood clot in a pulmonary artery in the lungs.
According to the CDC:
By Andrea Baer (Executive Director, The Mended Hearts, Inc.) and Michael Wong, JD (Founder/Executive Director, Physician-Patient Alliance for Health & Safety)
Making sure you have correct medical information—rather than misinformation (i.e., false information)—could save you from being admitted to the hospital or even save your life.
There is a lot of medical information and education on cardiovascular disease, particularly on the internet. But with that comes the problem of misinformation. Finding trustworthy information can be challenging, and relying upon wrong information can have health ramifications. Just because something is on the internet does not mean it’s medically true.
To read the complete article, please go to Patient Safety & Quality Healthcare by clicking here.
Editor’s note: Recently, CVS Caremark reversed its decision to exclude Eliquis (apixaban) from its formulary. This is an update to previous posts on this issue – “CVS Caremark Formulary Exclusion of Eliquis is a Patient Safety Risk,” “Non-Medication Switching is a Patient Safety Issue,” and “How a Patient Battled with CVS Caremark and Won”
By Michael Wong, JD (Founder & Executive Director, Physician-Patient Alliance for Health & Safety)
CVS Caremark has put patients first by putting Eliquis® (apixaban) back on its formulary. By doing so, they have stayed true to their motto – “Your health is our priority. At CVS Caremark, each and every one of us is dedicated to helping you on your path to better health.”
Now, I can’t say the same thing about its decision at the end of 2021, but I’ll let you be the judge of that. In its original decision, CVS Caremark (part of CVS Health) decided to exclude Eliquis from the CVS Caremark Preferred Drug List. Eliquis is “indicated to reduce the risk of stroke and systemic embolism in patients with NVAF. Eliquis is indicated for the treatment of DVT [deep vein thrombosis] and PE [pulmonary embolism], and to reduce the risk of recurrent DVT and PE following initial therapy.” Eliquis is a Factor Xa inhibitor and is a Direct Oral Anticoagulant (DOAC).
Continue reading “CVS Caremark’s Decision Putting Eliquis Back on Its Formulary Benefits Patients”
By Michael Wong, JD (Founder/Executive Director, Physician-Patient Alliance for Health & Safety)
This month of May is National Stroke Awareness Month. In thinking about National Stroke Awareness Month, I immediately thought of my friend, Mark McEwen, who most people know as a reporter for CBS:
Doctors are fighting to ensure their stroke patients are getting access to the medications they need, reports FOX13 News in Memphis, Tennessee:
Continue reading “Two Steps For Reducing Your Risk of Blood Clots”
In honor of Blood Clot Awareness Month 2022, here are 5 patient safety actions you can take to help save a life:
Continue reading “5 Patient Safety Actions You Can Take For Blood Clot Awareness Month”