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Hospital-Acquired Infections Tied To Nurse Staffing Ratios
The public was well-served today with the release of a report by the New
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Vermont Legislature Passes Law Regulating All Drug/Device Company Marketing, Requiring Disclosure Of Gifts To Doctors
The Vermont Legislature has passed legislation (S 48) that bans nearly all gifts from pharmaceutical and medical device companies to health care providers, administrators and facilities in the state, the New York Times reports. The legislation specifically would prohibit drug and device makers from giving providers no-cost meals. Vermont"s legislation would go further than similar laws in other states like Massachusetts and Minnesota by requiring drug and medical device manufacturers who give gifts to health providers to publicly disclose recipients" names and dollar amounts of payments and gifts. The measure would not require manufacturers to disclose payments for clinical research of products undergoing FDA review, the Times reports. The legislation also would eliminate a loophole that allows manufacturers to conceal certain expenses by claiming them as trade secrets. In a recent report, the Vermont Office of the Attorney General said that medical product makers spent about $2.9 million on promotional efforts to the state"s health care providers in fiscal year 2008 and that nearly half of the state"s 4,573 licensed providers had received some type of incentive from drugmakers in the same year. The report, which was developed prior to passage of the new legislation, offers only aggregate data, as 83% of the manufacturer-declared payments were deemed to be trade secrets, the Times reports.Gov. Jim Douglas (R) is expected to sign the law, which would take effect July 1. Several state medical groups -- including the Vermont Association for Mental Health and the Vermont Medical Society -- have indicated support for the legislation.Marjorie Powell, a senior lawyer for the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, said the requirements under the new law appear redundant with new voluntary guidelines the group has issued on physician gifting practices. She said, "We think this is unnecessary, and it is not going to improve patient care," adding, "It makes it onerous not only for the company but also for the physician in Vermont, because this is going to be on a Web site" (Singer, New York Times, 5/20). Drugshop to buy zoloft online and other pills.
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Obama Nominates Genetics Researcher Collins To Be NIH Director
President Obama on Wednesday nominated Francis Collins, a physician and genetics researcher, to be NIH director, the Washington Post reports (Brown, Washington Post, 7/9). Collins worked at the agency during the administrations of former Presidents Clinton and George W. Bush and served as director of the National Human Genome Research Institute, where he helped lead the Human Genome Project to sequence all human DNA (Young, The Hill, 7/8). He is also known for a 2006 best-selling book presenting scientific evidence for a belief in God. Collins resigned as head of the institute last year but remained a consultant. Since then, he established the BioLogos Foundation to "contribute to the public voice that represents the harmony of science and faith" (Maugh, Los Angeles Times, 7/9).Many researchers and health care experts praised Collins" nomination, though some others were not "entirely enthusiastic," according to the New York Times. The two major objections to his nomination involve his "very public embrace of religion" and his "important role in raising expectations [of gene research] impossibly high," according to the New York Times (Harris, New York Times, 7/9). Collins and his colleagues at the University of Michigan discovered the defective gene that causes cystic fibrosis in 1989. According to the Los Angeles Times, Collins is expected to be quickly confirmed (Los Angeles Times, 7/9).Broadcast Coverage NPR"s "Morning Edition" on Thursday included a discussion with NPR science correspondent Jon Hamilton about the nomination (Inskeep, "Morning Edition," NPR, 7/9).
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Joseph P. Vande Griend Receives 2009 APhA Clinical Research Paper Award

The American Pharmacists Association (APhA) is pleased to announce that Joseph P. Vande Griend, PharmD, BCPS, of Denver, Colorado, is the recipient of the 2009 APhA Clinical Research Paper Award. The award was presented during the APhA Annual Meeting and Exposition in San Antonio, Texas, April 3-6, 2009. Established in 2006, the Clinical Research Paper Award is intended to promote and encourage high-quality clinical research or practice based research in the clinical sciences by recognizing an original research article published in the Journal of the American Pharmacists Association (JAPhA). APhA"s awards program is pharmacy"s most comprehensive recognition program. Vande Griend was selected for this award for his innovative paper, "Vitamin D intervention by pharmacists in geriatric outpatients," appearing in the July-August 2008 issue of JAPhA. Co-authors include: Sunny A. Linnebur, PharmD, J. Mark Ruscin, PharmD, Sheryl F. Vondracek, PharmD, Pamela Wolfe, MS, and Michael T. McDermott, MD. Vande Griend is currently an Assistant Professor at the University of Colorado Denver School of Pharmacy. He also works as a clinical pharmacist with the University of Colorado Senior"s Clinic. At the clinic, he provides medication therapy management (MTM) services, drug therapy consultations, and serves as a preceptor for PharmD students. In 2005, Vande Griend graduated from the University of Iowa with his Doctor of Pharmacy degree (PharmD). He then completed a Pharmacy Practice residency at the University of Colorado Hospital and a Family Medicine residency at the University of Colorado Denver Health Science Center. American Pharmacists Association (APhA)


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