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How can health systems simultaneously improve population health and patient satisfaction, yet reduce per capita costs? A Walgreens model points the way.

New Rx, Generics, and OTC

For the third consecutive year, Walgreens is partnering with Greater Than AIDS and local health departments across the country to provide free HIV testing between June 27 and June 29.

Reports and presentations made during the Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education’s Advancing Quality in Pharmacy Education: Charting Accreditation’s Future Conference last year are available online.

Sagent Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Schaumburg, Ill., on June 11 announced a voluntary nationwide recall of three lots of vecuronium bromide for injection 10 mg (NDC number 25021-657-10).

Despite being considered a protected class of drugs, anticonvulsant medications for the treatment of epileptic seizures had lower levels of coverage for Medicare prescription drug plans (PDPs) than commercial health plans.

Unsafe injections remain a problem in the United States and throughout the world, according to a recent Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.

The Obama administration on Monday abandoned its attempt to restrict access to the emergency contraceptive Plan B One-Step (Teva Women’s Health Inc.) as an over-the-counter medication-a decision that’s being celebrated by some groups.

Aceto Corporation, Port Washington, N.Y., announced June 11 that its generics subsidiary, Rising Pharmaceuticals Inc., Paramus, N.J., will launch the 50-mg strength of riluzole tablets.

Older adults with diabetes mellitus may be at increased risk for Alzheimer’s disease or vascular dementia following a hypoglycemic event, according to a study published online by JAMA Internal Medicine on June 10th.

Faced with a 68-year-old woman undergoing chemotherapy for breast cancer that had spread to her lungs, chest, and spine, more than three quarters of doctors surveyed recently by the New England Journal of Medicine said they’d prescribe medical marijuana.

The Men’s Health Network is hoping actor Michael Douglas’ assertion that his throat cancer was caused by human papillomavirus contracted during oral sex will provoke more males to get the HPV vaccine.

The National Association of Chain Drug Stores Foundation today announced the second group of pharmacists accepted into its yearlong Faculty Scholars Program.

FDA has approved a new indication for lenalidomide (Revlimid, Celgene) for the treatment of patients with mantle cell lymphoma (MCL) whose disease has relapsed or progressed after two prior therapies, one of which included bortezomib.

A federal court in New Jersey has entered a consent judgment regarding the patent infringement litigation between Hanmi Pharmaceuticals (Seoul, Korea) and AstraZeneca (London).

FDA has launched two new tools designed to make it easier for consumers and healthcare professionals to report product information to its MedWatch program.

Endometrial cancer patients reduced their chance of death by 84% with the use of statins and aspirin, according to a new study by researchers at Montefiore Einstein Center for Cancer Care.

In a phase 3 study of previously treated patients with anaplastic lymphoma kinase-positive advanced non-small cell lung cancer, crizotinib (Xalkori, Pfizer) more than doubled median progression free survival than when treated with standard chemotherapy, according to a study published June 1, 2013 online in New England Journal of Medicine.

An audit of two electronic prescribing systems found frequent system-related errors. But the audit, published online in the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association, found that only a small percentage of those errors were serious and that e-PS prevent more errors than they create.

Nicotine replacement therapy, the antidepressant bupropion, and the drug varenicline can help smokers quit, according to a new systematic review published in The Cochrane Library.

Forty-three members of Congress are urging the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services not to implement a new policy that prohibits independent community pharmacies from providing same-day, home delivery of diabetes testing supplies to homebound seniors.

With forecasters predicting an active 2013 hurricane season, Rx Response is reminding disaster-response officials and the public of its two programs designed to keep the pharmaceutical pipeline uninterrupted during emergencies.

FDA advised healthcare professionals not to use magnesium sulfate injection for more than 5-7 days to stop preterm labor in pregnant women.

FDA has approved dabrafenib (Tafinlar, GlaxoSmithKline) and trametinib (Mekinist, GlaxoSmithKline) for patients with advanced (metastatic) or unresectable melanoma.

Decolonization of all intensive care unit patients with antimicrobial soap and ointment significantly reduces all bloodstream infections, including methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, according to a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

FDA announced May 29 its plans to permit importation of total parenteral nutrition injectable drugs that are in short supply from Norway. The drugs are used to treat premature infants, cancer patients, and gastrointestinal surgery patients who are not able to eat or drink by mouth.

Men using long-term, high dose prescription opioids for back pain were about 50% more likely to be using medications for erectile dysfunction than men with back pain who were not using opioids, according to a study published in a recent issue of Spine.