Medicare issued a final rule on November 1, 2006 under the Hospital Outpatient Prospective Payment System (HOPPS) that slashes reimbursement for multiple-scan heart imaging PET studies by 71 percent to $731.24, compared to $2,484.88 in 2006.
Under the HOPPS rule, the new rates for PET tumor imaging from skull base to midthigh will also drop by 26 percent to $855.43 compared to $1,150. Similarly, PET/CT imaging scans spanning from skull base to midthigh were cut by 24 percent, down to $950 from $1,250 in 2006.

McKesson, San Francisco, has agreed to purchase Per-Se Technologies, Alpharetta, Ga., in a deal worth $1.8 billion. The purchase, expected to close in the first quarter of 2007 if it meets regulatory approval, extends McKesson's reach in the pharmacy software systems arena as well as establishing a strong presence in the small physician-office practice-management software systems market, where Per-Se obtained a position through its August 2005 acquisition of the physician, hospital and retail pharmacy business of NDC Health for a reported $644 million.

The American Surgical Hospital Association (ASHA) announced that it is changing its name to Physician Hospitals of America (PHA). The new name reflects the association’s focus to promote the advancement of hospitals that include physicians as owners.

British finance minister Gordon Brown has launched a fund to immunize millions of children around the globe, calling it a great "Christmas present" for the world's poor. The 2.1-billion-pound (3.1-billion-euro, 4.0-billion-dollar) International Finance Facility for Immunization aims to pay for 500 million children over the next decade to be protected against polio, measles, diphtheria and hepatitis.

The fund works by selling long-term bonds to international money markets to raise money for developing countries now, with interest on these paid back using future aid funding.

Optio Healthcare today announced that Smith Northview Hospital, a 31-bed facility in rural Georgia, has selected Optio's subscription-based electronic health record (EHR) solution, QuickRecord(R), to provide physicians with remote access to lab results--an effort that will help the facility increase bottom-line revenue.

Researchers who thought they had identified the bacterial perpetrator of the often severe disease caused by community-associated methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (CA-MRSA) had better keep looking: Scientists at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health, have exonerated a toxin widely thought to be the guilty party.

Calypso Medical Technologies, Inc. officially launched its recently FDA 510(k) cleared Calypso 4D Localization System at ASTRO, providing a new technology for real-time target localization and tumor tracking for a variety of clinical applications.
The 4D Localization System utilizes electromagnetic technology in conjunction with Calypso’s implanted Beacon Electromagnetic Transponders, in the prostate, to provide tumor location information during external beam radiation therapy without adding ionizing radiation.

Varian Medical Systems announced at ASTRO that it has added new motion management capabilities to the Eclipse radiotherapy treatment planning system, designed to increase treatment precision for tumors in mobile areas of the body, such as the lung.

Doctors caring for the elderly and the disabled will see a 5 percent cut in reimbursement rates when they treat Medicare patients next year. But in an effort to give more personalized care, the government will pay physicians more to counsel patients on ways to improve their health.

Doctors warned that that the lower rates would lead to fewer doctors taking on new Medicare cases. The new rates were announced in rules the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services made public Wednesday.

Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. and ImClone Systems Inc. said a late-stage trial of their cancer drug Erbitux used along with another treatment in metastatic colorectal cancer failed to ensure overall survival.

The study compared irinotecan with irinotecan plus Erbitux in about 1,300 patients whose colorectal cancer was not responding to first-line oxaliplatin-based chemotherapy, the companies said.

The primary endpoint of overall survival was not met, said the companies' joint news release on Monday.

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