#prescription

#prescription

Many of the medicines on TrumpRx include brand-name drugs that patients can find cheaper elsewhere as generics. For instance, Protonix for heartburn is available for $200 on TrumpRx, but the generic version, pantoprazole, costs less than $30 with a GoodRx coupon.

The mail will stop if the agency can't meet its obligations. That includes critical deliveries like prescription drug packages. Postmaster General David Steiner warned lawmakers this week that USPS could run out of cash in less than 12 months without congressional action.

CareCloud disclosed a cybersecurity incident that may have resulted in patient information compromise, affecting one of its electronic health record environments for roughly 8 hours.

If it continues to spread past the demarcation that we usually draw using a skin marker-we say Sharpie, but it's a skin marker-we say that this is spreading. Diagnosis: possible sepsis. Varshavski was not talking to the patient or to nursing staff. He was not even in a hospital. He was speaking into a camera in a two-bedroom apartment on the fifty-sixth floor of a building in Hell's Kitchen, in a makeshift studio where he records videos and his popular podcast.

Pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) are opaque intermediaries-and they are unpopular with figures including Mark Cuban, who told Fortune that the way they bargain over drug prices is absurd, something that would never happen at the very same pharmacies buying a package of Pringles potato-chip products.

If you run a business, there's a familiar email you probably opened this fall: the one from your benefits broker with your 2026 health insurance renewal. You scroll. You see a double-digit increase, and your stomach drops. You want to do right by your team. You also have a P&L to protect. And the three standard options you're handed - pay the increase, raise deductibles or push more cost onto employees - all feel bad in different ways.

When generic drug manufacturers have issues like contamination, it is difficult for those who take the medications to know if they are affected. There is no standardized way to look up the data for where the pills in your bottle came from. ProPublica made an app that makes the lookup more straightforward. Even though generic drugs make up 90% of prescriptions dispensed in the U.S., the FDA only provides piecemeal information about them.

Yes, there has been a shocking lack of progress in developing transformative psychiatric medicine (We need new drugs for mental ill-health, 5 February), but this may be because in mental health, drugs are not always the answer (see, for example, Richard P Bentall's Doctoring the Mind). Huge progress has been made in the effectiveness of talking therapies for example, free effective treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is available to all UK army veterans through the charity PTSD Resolution.

But these studies typically require large numbers of patients, huge amounts of data, and thorough follow-ups, none of which comes easy or free. The upshot is fewer investigations into scenarios that are clinically important but unlikely to yield a profit for the firms funding them. Accordingly, researchers have been developing an option that uses real-world data from insurers to save patients from falling through the cracks.

AI plays an important role-but not by fixing fragmented data on its own. The work of organizing, connecting, and interpreting healthcare information still belongs to people and the systems they build. Where AI helps is after that foundation is in place: by bringing the right information forward at the right time, reducing the effort it takes to find what matters, and supporting better decisions in the moment of care.

The Food and Drug Administration commissioner's effort to drastically shorten the review of drugs favored by President Donald Trump's administration is causing alarm across the agency, stoking worries that the plan may run afoul of legal, ethical, and scientific standards long used to vet the safety and effectiveness of new medicines. Marty Makary's program is causing new anxiety and confusion among staff already rocked by layoffs, buyouts, and leadership upheavals, according to seven current or recently departed staffers.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is reportedly mulling whether more prescription drugs should be sold over the counter (OTC) at pharmacies. In an interview on Wednesday, FDA commissioner Martin Makary told CNBC that everything should be over the counter except drugs that are deemed unsafe or addictive or that require clinical monitoring. Makary said the agency is reviewing how it decides which drugs can be sold with or without a prescription from a health care practitioner.

My dad was in the emergency room, short of breath, chest tight, upper back aching. He looked pale and confused. An ultrasound showed excess fluid between his lung and chest wall. "We'll drain it," a resident said, as if he were unclogging a sink. For the next five days, thick, red-tinged fluid filled a plastic container beside my dad's hospital bed. Doctors sent his cells for "staining," a way to identify cancer. But no one used that word.

For years, Congress has signaled that it wants to crack down on Pharmacy Benefit Managers, the middle men that have come under fire for their vertical integration with insurers and their role in spiking drug costs. This week, it finally happened via the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2026, promptingemployer groups including the Purchaser Business Group on Health (PBGH) and the ERISA Industry Committee to cheer its passage.

Between March 2020 and March 2022, over 100 million telemedicine services were delivered to approximately 17 million Australians. The Australian government invested $409 million to make telehealth permanent, whilst the UK announced £600 million for digital health infrastructure in April 2025. Patient adoption is equally impressive: 60% find telemedicine more convenient than in-person appointments, 55% report higher satisfaction with teleconsultations, and 74% of millennials prefer virtual appointments for routine care. These aren't temporary shifts; they represent a fundamental transformation in healthcare delivery.

The world of medical practice management is changing faster than ever, driven by two simultaneous forces: escalating patient expectations and crushing administrative complexity. In my years working with healthcare organizations, I've seen these challenges evolve from nuisances into crises. Research by Bain & Company found that 65% of healthcare consumers want more convenient experiences, and 70% want more responsiveness from providers. They want instant answers to routine questions, immediate scheduling access and minimal friction.

As Theresa Defino recently reported, HHS OCR will prioritize risk assessments and expand its investigations into risk management in 2026. Alisa Chestler and Layna Cook Rush of Baker Donelson have summarized some recent recommendations from HHS OCR's January 2026 Cybersecurity Newsletter that regulated entities may want to pay increased attention to at this point: Patching Is a Required Risk Management Activity Legacy Systems and Unpatchable Vulnerabilities Are Not Excuses Unnecessary Software and Default Accounts Create Hidden Risk

In 2026, the US healthcare system is changing. Enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies have expired, causing premiums for marketplace plans to spike - and pricing some families out of health insurance entirely. President Donald Trump's One Big Beautiful Bill Act will reduce coverage for some patients with Medicaid and funding for hospitals, especially those in rural areas. Costs for Medicare and private insurance are also rising: Employer-based healthcare premiums have increased by 9%, the largest rise in more than a decade.