|
|
|
Health Care Briefs
|
Business New Haven
4/17/2000
By: John Florian
|
Anthem 'Excellent' Again
NORTH HAVEN - For a second year, the BlueCare Health Plan (an HMO product of Anthem Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Connecticut,) has received an “excellent” rating from the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) following a recent accreditation review.
Nationwide, only 40 health plans earned the “excellent” rating for exceeding NCQA's “rigorous requirements for consumer protection and quality improvement,” according to an Anthem spokesperson. The NCQA is an independent, non-profit organization that assesses and reports on the quality of care delivered by managed-care organizations.
The Anthem plan also brought home a top-notch report card, with four star ratings - the highest conferred - in all five areas of health care on the NCQA's new Health Plan Report Card. Those areas include: access and service, qualified providers, staying healthy, getting better and living with illness. The accreditation review considers a wide range of performance measures, from mammography and immunization rates to eye exams for diabetics. Consumer protection standards are also noted, including fairness in handling denials and appeals, emergency-room care coverage and sufficient access to care.
AIDS, Diabetes, Aging Get Research Funding
NEW HAVEN - Halting the spread of AIDS among drug users. Improving the lives of children with diabetes. Finding what causes people to age prematurely. These are the goals of recently-funded research at Yale University.
AIDS deaths have declined dramatically over the past four years, by as much as 70 percent, says Gerald Friedland, M.D., director of the AIDS Program at Yale and co-investigator of newly funded studies with the University of Connecticut. As evidence, he points out that five years ago, Yale-New Haven Hospital saw about 40 AIDS patients each day. Today, that number is closer to 10 to 12 patients daily.
The problem, Friedland explains, is that the AIDS virus becomes resistant to drug therapies unless the combination of drugs is varied. Drugs must also be taken on a rigid schedule for the remainder of the patient's life. Since only about half of the HIV-positive population is currently under treatment, the $6 million grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse is designed to bring more active and recovering drug users into treatments. A second study will seek ways to reduce risky behavior among HIV-positive drug users and others with HIV infection.
A second grant, of $2.4 million from the National Institute of Nursing Research, permits Yale School of Nursing Associate Dean Margaret Grey to continue her work in improving the lives of adolescents with diabetes. Grey's earlier work developed ways for adolescents to cope with diabetes, and youths who received this training showed a 42-percent improvement in metabolic control, according to Yale officials. They also scored better on quality-of-life measurements, including fewer worries about their diabetes. The new grant allows continued study of these adolescents to test long-term results and develop more coping-skills training.
In addition, Fuki Hisama, assistant professor of neurology at the Yale School of Medicine, has been awarded $450,000 for her research into a gene responsible for Werner Syndrome - a disease that causes people to age prematurely. Though rare, and affecting only one in two to five million people, the disease attacks people worldwide, and usually results in death from a heart attack or stroke when victims are in their 40s. Typically, they begin aging in their late teens, developing gray hair, cataracts, cancer, osteoporosis and hardening of the arteries.
Hisama was a member of a team that in 1996 identified the mutated gene that causes the disease. “The premature aging may be related in some way to DNA damage and DNA repair,” Hisama says, adding that further research may yield clues to the aging process.
New CATs Move In
NEW HAVEN - The latest generation CAT, or CT scan equipment - which scans 3.6 times faster than traditional scanners - has arrived at Yale-New Haven Hospital. The two GE LightSpeed CT scanners have been installed in the diagnostic-imaging department and the emergency department. According to the hospital, the units are not available elsewhere in Connecticut, and YNHH is one of a handful of sites anywhere with two such scanners.
Scanners let physicians view internal anatomy without surgery. The fast GE scanners reduce patients' exposure time to X-rays, and within 17 seconds can scan the chest, abdomen and pelvis, explains Bruce McClennan, M.D., the hospital's chief of radiology.
Two Firsts for Griffin
DERBY - Credit Griffin Hospital cardiologist Andrew Rashkow with two firsts: He's the first cardiologist at Griffin to be board-certified in interventional cardiology after passing the first interventional cardiology exam ever given by the American Board of Internal Medicine. This branch of cardiology involves procedures such as balloon angioplasties and cardiac catherizations.
Also at Griffin, three new physicians have been appointed to the medical staff. Ana V. Delgado, M.D., of Cheshire, has joined the active staff in the Department of Anesthesiology's Division of Perioperative Anesthesia. Jay Meizlish, M.D., who has an interventional and consultative cardiology practice in Fairfield, has joined the courtesy staff in the Department of Medicine's Division of Cardiology. And Estelle Pappas, DPM, was appointed to the courtesy staff in the Department of Surgery's Division of Podiatry.
More Shoreline Services
BRANFORD - Shoreline residents scheduled to undergo surgery at New Haven's Hospital of Saint Raphael can now complete pre-admission testing at St. Raphael's Occupational/Rehabilitation Center, 22 Summit Place, Branford. A full range of blood testing services is also offered there for surgical patients, and for participants in ConnectiCare, Wellcare and Medspan who are required to use Saint Raphael's laboratory.
The pre-admission testing center is open from 8 a.m. to noon on weekdays. Appointments are recommended, by calling 203-488-6540. However, appointments are not needed for blood testing, offered from 8 a.m. to noon daily except Sunday.
Web of Health Help
NEW HAVEN - If you've access to the Internet, the answers to more than a thousand health questions are just a few key strokes away. Yale New Haven Hospital's Health Information Library is now online at the hospital's web site (www.ynhh.org). Library visitors can browse for topics within a category - such as arthritis, headaches and newborn care - or enter a key word for a special need.
This information is also available by phone, along with hundreds of additional topics on raising children and women's health. For this, call the Audio Health Library toll-free at 877-828-7888.
Roger Scalettar, M.D., Anthem's vice president of medical policy, said the accreditation rating and four-star report card “truly confirms for us and our customers that we are on target meeting their health plan needs.”
|
Go FirstGo PreviousGo
NextGo LastGo
to Index
|
|
