Managed care pharmacists will play a key role in reforming the current health care system by continuing to develop innovative programs that reduce costs and improve quality of care, said Mark McClellan, MD, PhD, director of the Engelberg Center for Health Care Reform at the Brookings Institution in Washington, DC. He discussed the effects of the recent health care reform legislation in a presentation at the Academy of Managed Care Pharmacy meeting. More »

Schizophrenia, a devastating mental illness that affects nearly 2.2 million Americans, is associated with high rates of morbidity and mortality.1 Persons with schizophrenia have a 20% shorter life expectancy than the general population.1,2 Furthermore, among persons with schizophrenia, there is an increased prevalence of metabolic syndrome characterized by a constellation of risk factors, including insulin resistance, abdominal obesity, dyslipidemia, hyperglycemia, and hypertension,3 More »

The Fifth International AIDS Society Conference on HIV Pathogenesis, Treatment, and Prevention (IAS 2009) was held in Cape Town, South Africa, from July 19 to 22, 2009. More than 5500 delegates from more than 100 countries attended this annual event. More »

The medications currently approved for the treatment of insomnia include 9 benzodiazepine receptor agonist (BZRA) hypnotics and the selective melatonin receptor agonist ramelteon. More »

Health plans are increasingly shifting costs to plan members to share the burden of rising health care costs. A survey of the published literature and conference presentations was conducted to examine the contributors and burden of out-of-pocket costs (OPCs) for persons with diagnosed cancer. This review indicates that the OPCs for cancer patients covered by health plans are increasing and becoming a financial burden that may be exacerbated by a concomitant loss of income. Furthermore,... More »