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FDA's new draft guidance seeks to prevent heparin medication errors and ensure safety of heparin-containing medical devices and combination products.

QS/1, a healthcare solutions provider, has partnered with American Associated Pharmacies (AAP) to help its independent pharmacy members improve their buying power and better compete with larger competitors.

At the White House Conference on Aging, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS) proposed new rules to improve the care of approximately 1.5 million elderly who reside in more than 15,000 long-term care (LTC) facilities nationwide. If finalized, a pharmacist will review a resident's chart at least every 6 months.

Value-based care is transforming the world of healthcare. Simple cost management must give way to utilization management, and alignment of stakeholder services is inevitable.

The 2015 guidelines are expected to clarify many current ambiguities.

Vaccines are specialty medicines in pharmacy inventory management. Here are some tips on their proper handling, storage, delivery, and administration.

Federal and state laws impose limits on the amount of pseudoephedrine a person may buy and a pharmacy may sell. Your state's limits may be more strict than the limits imposed by the feds.

Is it really good medicine when legislators call the shots?

If you don't know what you want in a manager, you're far more likely to end up unsatisfied. Better give it some thought.

For patients, preventive services are a vital healthcare resource. For the healthcare delivery system, they produce cost savings. Pharmacists are a key link.

As clinical specialists, these pharmacists are in the best position to monitor psychiatric patients, who often have other medical issues and are receiving additional drug therapies.

Statins and ED drugs lead the way, and there are plenty more on the horizon.

Research results indicated that while intracranial hemorrhage is frequently observed in patients with brain metastases, treatment with low molecular weight heparin does not increase the risk.

The combination product is indicated to treat either complicated intra-abdominal infections, where it is used in combination with metronidazole, or complicated urinary tract infections in patients with few or no other treatment options.

Letters, e-mails, comments, and posts from Drug Topics readers

Some tips for keeping these hardworking organs happy and healthy.

As specialty meds pour out of the pipeline, pharmacists knowledgeable in disease states and side effects stand ready to manage administration and patient monitoring.

MI and stroke risk can rise just weeks after NSAID use commences. Labels will be updated to reflect this.

Last month, the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists (ASHP) approved a policy that calls for adequate pharmacist representation on state boards of pharmacy by pharmacists from various practice settings, including hospitals, health systems, clinics, and nontraditional settings, to ensure proper oversight to protect public health.

Patients hospitalized for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) are at high risk for 30- and 60-day readmissions. In 2008, the mean 60-day admission rate following an emergency department visit of COPD patients was 18% and the mean readmission rate was more than 30%.

As sponsor of The Skin Cancer Foundation’s Road to Healthy Skin Tour, Rite Aid will offer free skin cancer screenings at locations in Maryland, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Virginia this summer.

FDA approved sacubitril/valsartan (Entresto, Novartis), an angiotensin receptor neprilysin inhibitor (ARNI), a first-in-class drug for heart failure. It is indicated for patients whose condition is classified NYHA class II-IV, to reduce the risk of cardiovascular death and heart failure hospitalization.

Who wouldn't want a med specialist on hand when they're wheeled into the Emergency Department?

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf recently signed legislation that allows children as young as nine to receive flu vaccinations at local pharmacies.

The number of methamphetamine lab seizures in West Virginia is plummeting, and some are attributing that decline to pharmacy restrictions on pseudoephedrine products such as Sudafed and Claritin-D.

California Governor Jerry Brown recently signed a bill into law that eliminates religious and other personal exemptions some parents previously used to keep their children from getting vaccinations that prevent communicable diseases.

Patients enrolled in public health exchange plans have a harder time with medication adherence than those in traditional health plans, a recent Express Scripts report found.

The Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP) issued a warning in June to stop using dosing cups for liquid medicine that are embossed with scales for drams, ounces, teaspoon, and tablespoon measures. These measurement scales can be easily confused with the milliliter dosing scales.