HHRI Media Coverage
2023
August
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
As rates of sexually transmitted infections continue to skyrocket across the United States, a growing number of physicians are prescribing a commonly used antibiotic as a way to prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis infections in gay and bisexual men and transgender women. Doxycycline is a class of medications traditionally used to treat bacterial STIs after someone has been infected. Yet recent research suggests that one 200mg dose of the drug can be effective in preventing such infections among men who have sex with men if taken within 72 hours after unprotected sex. This approach, called doxyPEP, has garnered so much attention that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to post draft guidance for public comment in the next several weeks on how health care workers may deploy the preventative treatment, such as how many pills should go into a prescription or which people could benefit most from the drug. In one study, more than 400 women in Kenya were separated into two groups: One group was given doxyPEP to take after having sex, and the other group wasn’t. The researchers — from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, the University of Washington and Kenya Medical Research Institute — found that there was not much of a difference in the incidence of bacterial STIs between the two groups. “It was a disappointment to see that doxycycline PEP was not protective for cisgender women in the dPEP Kenya Study. We now have data to help understand these results a bit more,” Dr. Jenell Stewart, project director for the DoxyPEP Kenya study and infectious disease physician at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, said in an email. That new data reveals that there were low rates of women in the study actually taking doxycycline, Stewart said, as well as a high prevalence of a gonorrhea strain that is known to be resistant to the medication. She added that it remains unclear why some of the study participants were not taking their doxyPEP pills, which probably skewed the study findings.
Many people show early signs of dementia such as memory loss, but their families hesitate to talk to their primary care clinician about their symptoms. They assume that such symptoms are just a sign of getting old, or are fearful of the diagnosis of dementia or are in denial. For these, and sometimes cultural reasons, many of those who are elderly in the Black community have a delayed diagnosis of dementia, such that it has progressed to the point that they need in-home or nursing home care. It is usually a family member who brings their loved one in to see the doctor, but by then most patients have had symptoms for 2-3 years. To ensure early detection of dementia, family members are especially crucial to provide a ‘history’, or story of the symptoms at each clinic visit, as the patient cannot provide a reliable history. More than six million Americans are living with Alzheimer’s disease or other types of dementia. However, Blacks in the U.S. have about twice the risk of developing dementia compared with non-Hispanic Whites. According to Alzheimer’s Association, 21 percent of older Blacks in the U.S. are living with dementia. Recent research indicates that this increased risk of dementia is likely due to a combination of the higher prevalence of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular (brain) disease and associated risk factors, such as high blood pressure, diabetes, and high BMI (body mass index), as well as social determinants of health, and some genetic factors. Participating in the new Healthy Aging in the Senior Years—or HATS study—offers a new opportunity to help advance research in dementia in the Black population. The HATS study is designed to identify risk factors for dementia in Black patients to help prevent dementia, and to help with early detection of cognitive impairment and dementia. The study is a five-year observational study—not a clinical trial, so no medications will be given—that will measure cardiovascular and other risk factors for dementia in Black community members 55 years and older in the Twin Cities. It is a collaborative study between Dr. Anne Murray and the Berman Center, part of the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in downtown Minneapolis, Dr. David Knopman and the Mayo Clinic, and two community engagement partners, HueMan and the Lync. Both partners have been critical in informing the HATS study design, build community trust, and grow enrollment.
July
The first real-time tracker of opioid abuse in Minnesota has found an unexpected trend: a summertime increase in overdoses and other drug-related health problems that end up in the hospital. The observation is the first of many that Hennepin County leaders are hoping they will produce through a new dashboard in order to improve their response to the opioid epidemic. "Up until now we have been reliant on data that is often two to three years old to make decisions about funding and interventions and to understand where we are at in this crisis," said Dr. Tyler Winkelman, a Hennepin Healthcare physician. The dashboard is the product of a new consortium of hospitals that are sharing instant data to better identify and address public health problems. It debuted earlier this month with drug-related data from all Hennepin County hospitals that could be sorted by drug type, age, gender and race.
A new online dashboard using real-time electronic health data looks to monitor the impacts of opioid and substance use in Hennepin County. The SUD dashboard, or substance use disorder dashboard, was launched by Hennepin County and the Minnesota Electronic Health Record Consortium. The near real-time date shows how people are accessing Hennepin County emergency departments, staying in-patient for substance use disorder, and helps officials identify emerging trends related to opioid and substance use. “The dashboard shows the near real-time impact of the substance use crisis in Hennepin County hospitals,” said Dr. Tyler Winkelman, General Internal Medicine Division Director at Hennepin Healthcare who leads the project for the MN EHR Consortium. “It can be used to identify emerging trends like the rise in opioid overdoses or to confirm that methamphetamine use is of concern.” Data displayed through the SUD can also be a driving factor for funding substance use initiatives in Hennepin County.
As the opioid and substance use crisis continues to mount, the Minnesota Electronic Health Record Consortium and Hennepin County have revealed their new, real-time substance use disorder dashboard. This interactive system is updated monthly with a compilation of Hennepin County emergency and hospital visits where substances are found. The data includes a patient's age, gender, race or ethnicity, and location demographics and has records that go back as far as 2012. The SUD was made by the EHR Consortium, but Hennepin Healthcare and Hennepin County remained partners throughout the project. The participating hospitals include Allina, HealthPartners, M Health Fairview, North Memorial, and the Veteran's Administration.
Sara Kathryn Smith, MD, knows better than most that studying pediatric organ transplant recipients in adulthood can be a challenge. Smith, the medical director of pediatric liver transplantation at Johns Hopkins Children's Center in Baltimore, is a transplant recipient herself. "Following somebody 20, 30 years after a liver transplant when they are out there running their life and having no issues at all, it is hard to convince them to come back every month for labs," Smith said. Long-term follow-up could identify ways to keep patients healthier longer. As another pediatric transplant hepatologist, Evelyn Hsu, MD, put it: "We want to make these kids into grandparents, not get them 1 year of life or 5 years of life." Research shows there may be plenty of room to improve patients' long-term survival. Risk for premature death among pediatric transplant recipients is as much as 130 times higher relative to peers matched by age, sex, and hometown during a median follow-up of 18 years after transplant, according to a study from Finland published in the March issue of Pediatric Transplantation. Cardiovascular disease, infections, and cancer were common causes of death. The study is the first to assess the survival rate for pediatric patients two decades after surgery, the researchers say. Groups in the United States recognize the importance of capturing similar long-term data. The Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients (SRTR) held a conference in July 2022 to identify which sorts of data related to transplantation outcomes are of interest to patients, families, and healthcare professionals for assessing the performance of the transplantation system and informing decision-making. Attendees agreed that documenting long-term outcomes for all patients and living donors is "a moral and ethical obligation." The Chronic Disease Research Group, a division of the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, operates the SRTR. The registry supports any effort to improve the organ donation and transplantation system, director Jon Snyder, PhD, said.
June
The two largest U.S. health plans share a birthday, July 30, 1965, but they have different roles and public images. A law signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson created Medicare, which serves people age 65 and older, and Medicaid, which covers people considered to be poor by government standards. Both programs also cover people with disabilities, contributing to overlap between Medicaid and Medicare. About 12.2 million people of the about 60 million people enrolled in Medicare in 2018 also had Medicaid coverage. People tend to remain enrolled in Medicare. In 2022, 55.5 million of the 63.8 million participants were age 65 and older, according to the 2022 Medicare trustees report. The rest of the enrollees qualified due to disabilities. Not so with Medicaid, where there is more churn. People gain Medicaid coverage when they lose jobs — for instance, during the recession stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic — and drop it when they become employed again. Some people with disabilities also rely on Medicaid coverage while waiting to qualify for Medicare. While Medicaid is a safety-net program for many Americans, Medicare is more of an aspiration, which enjoys a significant base of bipartisan support. Pregnant women referred by courts and other criminal justice agencies for opioid abuse treatment were more likely to get medications to help them manage their condition if they lived in states that had expanded their Medicaid eligibility, wrote Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc of the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute of Minneapolis, and his co-authors. The rate at which medication for opioid use disorder was prescribed for pregnant women rose from 21.4% to 36% in the states studied that had expanded their Medicaid eligibility. In the states that did not expand Medicaid, the rate increased from 7.0% to 9.6%.
Interventions to address stimulant and opioid use that consider race and gender may prove more effective at preventing overdose deaths than current methods, according to a Penn State-led team of researchers who studied how drug treatment admissions and overdose deaths differed among race and gender. The researchers found that minority communities bore the brunt of the crisis in both urban and rural areas. They reported their findings in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence. The United States recorded more than 580,000 opioid and stimulant-related overdose deaths in the last 20 years, with 100,000 deaths in 2020 alone. Drug overdose deaths in the U.S. have continued to climb despite rising treatment admissions, with Black men and American Indian/Native Alaskan men and women hit the hardest by the overdose crisis, according to Penn State's Abenaa Jones, the Ann Atherton Early Career Professor in Health and Human Development and assistant professor of human development and family studies, who was lead author on the paper. In the last two decades the crisis has hit hardest in high-distressed neighborhoods, or rural and urban places with low income, a lack of housing, underserved schools, and other factors that would put an individual at a disadvantage simply by living there, said Jones. Racial and ethnic minorities tend to live in these areas at higher rates than white individuals, and the stress caused by living in these adverse environments may lead to substance use as a means to cope. Higher distressed neighborhoods are more likely to see tainted drug supplies than other places, which can lead to the increased likelihood of fatal overdoses. In addition, these areas may lack access to naloxone, the life-saving opioid overdose reversal drug, she added. Other contributors to this work were Riley Shearer, University of Minnesota; Alexis Santos-Lozada, Penn State; Sienna Strong-Jones, Penn State; Noel Vest, Boston University; Daniel Teixeira da Silva, University of Pennsylvania; Utsha Khatri, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai; and Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc, Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute of Minneapolis, and his co-authors. For the study, Winkelman and co-authors analyzed data collected from 1992 to 2017, identifying records for cases of 131,838 pregnant women with opioid use disorder. They drew these from the Treatment Episode Data Set-Admissions (TEDS-A) program, an annual national survey conducted by the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). More than half — 63.3% — percent of the women in the sample studied were between the ages aged 18–29.
Interventions to address stimulant and opioid use that consider race and gender may prove more effective at preventing overdose deaths than current methods, according to a Penn State-led team of researchers who studied how drug treatment admissions and overdose deaths differed among race and gender. The researchers found that minority communities bore the brunt of the crisis in both urban and rural areas. They reported their findings in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence. The United States recorded more than 580,000 opioid and stimulant-related overdose deaths in the last 20 years, with 100,000 deaths in 2020 alone. Drug overdose deaths in the U.S. have continued to climb despite rising treatment admissions, with Black men and American Indian/Native Alaskan men and women hit the hardest by the overdose crisis, according to Penn State's Abenaa Jones, the Ann Atherton Early Career Professor in Health and Human Development and assistant professor of human development and family studies, who was lead author on the paper. In the last two decades the crisis has hit hardest in high-distressed neighborhoods, or rural and urban places with low income, a lack of housing, underserved schools, and other factors that would put an individual at a disadvantage simply by living there, said Jones. Racial and ethnic minorities tend to live in these areas at higher rates than white individuals, and the stress caused by living in these adverse environments may lead to substance use as a means to cope. Higher distressed neighborhoods are more likely to see tainted drug supplies than other places, which can lead to the increased likelihood of fatal overdoses. In addition, these areas may lack access to naloxone, the life-saving opioid overdose reversal drug, she added. Other contributors to this work were Riley Shearer, University of Minnesota; Alexis Santos-Lozada, Penn State; Sienna Strong-Jones, Penn State; Noel Vest, Boston University; Daniel Teixeira da Silva, University of Pennsylvania; Utsha Khatri, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai; and Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc, Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute of Minneapolis, and his co-authors. For the study, Winkelman and co-authors analyzed data collected from 1992 to 2017, identifying records for cases of 131,838 pregnant women with opioid use disorder. They drew these from the Treatment Episode Data Set-Admissions (TEDS-A) program, an annual national survey conducted by the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). More than half — 63.3% — percent of the women in the sample studied were between the ages aged 18–29.
Interventions to address stimulant and opioid use that consider race and gender may prove more effective at preventing overdose deaths than current methods, according to a Penn State-led team of researchers who studied how drug treatment admissions and overdose deaths differed among race and gender. The researchers found that minority communities bore the brunt of the crisis in both urban and rural areas. They reported their findings in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence. The United States recorded more than 580,000 opioid and stimulant-related overdose deaths in the last 20 years, with 100,000 deaths in 2020 alone. Drug overdose deaths in the U.S. have continued to climb despite rising treatment admissions, with Black men and American Indian/Native Alaskan men and women hit the hardest by the overdose crisis, according to Penn State's Abenaa Jones, the Ann Atherton Early Career Professor in Health and Human Development and assistant professor of human development and family studies, who was lead author on the paper. In the last two decades the crisis has hit hardest in high-distressed neighborhoods, or rural and urban places with low income, a lack of housing, underserved schools, and other factors that would put an individual at a disadvantage simply by living there, said Jones. Racial and ethnic minorities tend to live in these areas at higher rates than white individuals, and the stress caused by living in these adverse environments may lead to substance use as a means to cope. Higher distressed neighborhoods are more likely to see tainted drug supplies than other places, which can lead to the increased likelihood of fatal overdoses. In addition, these areas may lack access to naloxone, the life-saving opioid overdose reversal drug, she added. Other contributors to this work were Riley Shearer, University of Minnesota; Alexis Santos-Lozada, Penn State; Sienna Strong-Jones, Penn State; Noel Vest, Boston University; Daniel Teixeira da Silva, University of Pennsylvania; Utsha Khatri, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai; and Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc, Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute of Minneapolis, and his co-authors. For the study, Winkelman and co-authors analyzed data collected from 1992 to 2017, identifying records for cases of 131,838 pregnant women with opioid use disorder. They drew these from the Treatment Episode Data Set-Admissions (TEDS-A) program, an annual national survey conducted by the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). More than half — 63.3% — percent of the women in the sample studied were between the ages aged 18–29.
Interventions to address stimulant and opioid use that consider race and gender may prove more effective at preventing overdose deaths than current methods, according to a Penn State-led team of researchers who studied how drug treatment admissions and overdose deaths differed among race and gender. The researchers found that minority communities bore the brunt of the crisis in both urban and rural areas. They reported their findings in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence. The United States recorded more than 580,000 opioid and stimulant-related overdose deaths in the last 20 years, with 100,000 deaths in 2020 alone. Drug overdose deaths in the U.S. have continued to climb despite rising treatment admissions, with Black men and American Indian/Native Alaskan men and women hit the hardest by the overdose crisis, according to Penn State's Abenaa Jones, the Ann Atherton Early Career Professor in Health and Human Development and assistant professor of human development and family studies, who was lead author on the paper. In the last two decades the crisis has hit hardest in high-distressed neighborhoods, or rural and urban places with low income, a lack of housing, underserved schools, and other factors that would put an individual at a disadvantage simply by living there, said Jones. Racial and ethnic minorities tend to live in these areas at higher rates than white individuals, and the stress caused by living in these adverse environments may lead to substance use as a means to cope. Higher distressed neighborhoods are more likely to see tainted drug supplies than other places, which can lead to the increased likelihood of fatal overdoses. In addition, these areas may lack access to naloxone, the life-saving opioid overdose reversal drug, she added. Other contributors to this work were Riley Shearer, University of Minnesota; Alexis Santos-Lozada, Penn State; Sienna Strong-Jones, Penn State; Noel Vest, Boston University; Daniel Teixeira da Silva, University of Pennsylvania; Utsha Khatri, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai; and Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc, Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute of Minneapolis, and his co-authors. For the study, Winkelman and co-authors analyzed data collected from 1992 to 2017, identifying records for cases of 131,838 pregnant women with opioid use disorder. They drew these from the Treatment Episode Data Set-Admissions (TEDS-A) program, an annual national survey conducted by the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). More than half — 63.3% — percent of the women in the sample studied were between the ages aged 18–29.
Interventions to address stimulant and opioid use that consider race and gender may prove more effective at preventing overdose deaths than current methods, according to a Penn State-led team of researchers who studied how drug treatment admissions and overdose deaths differed among race and gender. The researchers found that minority communities bore the brunt of the crisis in both urban and rural areas. They reported their findings in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence. The United States recorded more than 580,000 opioid and stimulant-related overdose deaths in the last 20 years, with 100,000 deaths in 2020 alone. Drug overdose deaths in the U.S. have continued to climb despite rising treatment admissions, with Black men and American Indian/Native Alaskan men and women hit the hardest by the overdose crisis, according to Penn State's Abenaa Jones, the Ann Atherton Early Career Professor in Health and Human Development and assistant professor of human development and family studies, who was lead author on the paper. In the last two decades the crisis has hit hardest in high-distressed neighborhoods, or rural and urban places with low income, a lack of housing, underserved schools, and other factors that would put an individual at a disadvantage simply by living there, said Jones. Racial and ethnic minorities tend to live in these areas at higher rates than white individuals, and the stress caused by living in these adverse environments may lead to substance use as a means to cope. Higher distressed neighborhoods are more likely to see tainted drug supplies than other places, which can lead to the increased likelihood of fatal overdoses. In addition, these areas may lack access to naloxone, the life-saving opioid overdose reversal drug, she added. Other contributors to this work were Riley Shearer, University of Minnesota; Alexis Santos-Lozada, Penn State; Sienna Strong-Jones, Penn State; Noel Vest, Boston University; Daniel Teixeira da Silva, University of Pennsylvania; Utsha Khatri, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai; and Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc, Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute of Minneapolis, and his co-authors. For the study, Winkelman and co-authors analyzed data collected from 1992 to 2017, identifying records for cases of 131,838 pregnant women with opioid use disorder. They drew these from the Treatment Episode Data Set-Admissions (TEDS-A) program, an annual national survey conducted by the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). More than half — 63.3% — percent of the women in the sample studied were between the ages aged 18–29.
Interventions to address stimulant and opioid use that consider race and gender may prove more effective at preventing overdose deaths than current methods, according to a Penn State-led team of researchers who studied how drug treatment admissions and overdose deaths differed among race and gender. The researchers found that minority communities bore the brunt of the crisis in both urban and rural areas. They reported their findings in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence. The United States recorded more than 580,000 opioid and stimulant-related overdose deaths in the last 20 years, with 100,000 deaths in 2020 alone. Drug overdose deaths in the U.S. have continued to climb despite rising treatment admissions, with Black men and American Indian/Native Alaskan men and women hit the hardest by the overdose crisis, according to Penn State's Abenaa Jones, the Ann Atherton Early Career Professor in Health and Human Development and assistant professor of human development and family studies, who was lead author on the paper. In the last two decades the crisis has hit hardest in high-distressed neighborhoods, or rural and urban places with low income, a lack of housing, underserved schools, and other factors that would put an individual at a disadvantage simply by living there, said Jones. Racial and ethnic minorities tend to live in these areas at higher rates than white individuals, and the stress caused by living in these adverse environments may lead to substance use as a means to cope. Higher distressed neighborhoods are more likely to see tainted drug supplies than other places, which can lead to the increased likelihood of fatal overdoses. In addition, these areas may lack access to naloxone, the life-saving opioid overdose reversal drug, she added. Other contributors to this work were Riley Shearer, University of Minnesota; Alexis Santos-Lozada, Penn State; Sienna Strong-Jones, Penn State; Noel Vest, Boston University; Daniel Teixeira da Silva, University of Pennsylvania; Utsha Khatri, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai; and Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc, Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute of Minneapolis, and his co-authors. For the study, Winkelman and co-authors analyzed data collected from 1992 to 2017, identifying records for cases of 131,838 pregnant women with opioid use disorder. They drew these from the Treatment Episode Data Set-Admissions (TEDS-A) program, an annual national survey conducted by the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). More than half — 63.3% — percent of the women in the sample studied were between the ages aged 18–29.
Interventions to address stimulant and opioid use that consider race and gender may prove more effective at preventing overdose deaths than current methods, according to a Penn State-led team of researchers who studied how drug treatment admissions and overdose deaths differed among race and gender. The researchers found that minority communities bore the brunt of the crisis in both urban and rural areas. They reported their findings in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence. The United States recorded more than 580,000 opioid and stimulant-related overdose deaths in the last 20 years, with 100,000 deaths in 2020 alone. Drug overdose deaths in the U.S. have continued to climb despite rising treatment admissions, with Black men and American Indian/Native Alaskan men and women hit the hardest by the overdose crisis, according to Penn State's Abenaa Jones, the Ann Atherton Early Career Professor in Health and Human Development and assistant professor of human development and family studies, who was lead author on the paper. In the last two decades the crisis has hit hardest in high-distressed neighborhoods, or rural and urban places with low income, a lack of housing, underserved schools, and other factors that would put an individual at a disadvantage simply by living there, said Jones. Racial and ethnic minorities tend to live in these areas at higher rates than white individuals, and the stress caused by living in these adverse environments may lead to substance use as a means to cope. Higher distressed neighborhoods are more likely to see tainted drug supplies than other places, which can lead to the increased likelihood of fatal overdoses. In addition, these areas may lack access to naloxone, the life-saving opioid overdose reversal drug, she added. Other contributors to this work were Riley Shearer, University of Minnesota; Alexis Santos-Lozada, Penn State; Sienna Strong-Jones, Penn State; Noel Vest, Boston University; Daniel Teixeira da Silva, University of Pennsylvania; Utsha Khatri, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai; and Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc, Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute of Minneapolis, and his co-authors. For the study, Winkelman and co-authors analyzed data collected from 1992 to 2017, identifying records for cases of 131,838 pregnant women with opioid use disorder. They drew these from the Treatment Episode Data Set-Admissions (TEDS-A) program, an annual national survey conducted by the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). More than half — 63.3% — percent of the women in the sample studied were between the ages aged 18–29.
Interventions to address stimulant and opioid use that consider race and gender may prove more effective at preventing overdose deaths than current methods, according to a Penn State-led team of researchers who studied how drug treatment admissions and overdose deaths differed among race and gender. The researchers found that minority communities bore the brunt of the crisis in both urban and rural areas. They reported their findings in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence. The United States recorded more than 580,000 opioid and stimulant-related overdose deaths in the last 20 years, with 100,000 deaths in 2020 alone. Drug overdose deaths in the U.S. have continued to climb despite rising treatment admissions, with Black men and American Indian/Native Alaskan men and women hit the hardest by the overdose crisis, according to Penn State's Abenaa Jones, the Ann Atherton Early Career Professor in Health and Human Development and assistant professor of human development and family studies, who was lead author on the paper. In the last two decades the crisis has hit hardest in high-distressed neighborhoods, or rural and urban places with low income, a lack of housing, underserved schools, and other factors that would put an individual at a disadvantage simply by living there, said Jones. Racial and ethnic minorities tend to live in these areas at higher rates than white individuals, and the stress caused by living in these adverse environments may lead to substance use as a means to cope. Higher distressed neighborhoods are more likely to see tainted drug supplies than other places, which can lead to the increased likelihood of fatal overdoses. In addition, these areas may lack access to naloxone, the life-saving opioid overdose reversal drug, she added. Other contributors to this work were Riley Shearer, University of Minnesota; Alexis Santos-Lozada, Penn State; Sienna Strong-Jones, Penn State; Noel Vest, Boston University; Daniel Teixeira da Silva, University of Pennsylvania; Utsha Khatri, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai; and Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc, Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute of Minneapolis, and his co-authors. For the study, Winkelman and co-authors analyzed data collected from 1992 to 2017, identifying records for cases of 131,838 pregnant women with opioid use disorder. They drew these from the Treatment Episode Data Set-Admissions (TEDS-A) program, an annual national survey conducted by the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). More than half — 63.3% — percent of the women in the sample studied were between the ages aged 18–29.
Interventions to address stimulant and opioid use that consider race and gender may prove more effective at preventing overdose deaths than current methods, according to a Penn State-led team of researchers who studied how drug treatment admissions and overdose deaths differed among race and gender. The researchers found that minority communities bore the brunt of the crisis in both urban and rural areas. They reported their findings in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence. The United States recorded more than 580,000 opioid and stimulant-related overdose deaths in the last 20 years, with 100,000 deaths in 2020 alone. Drug overdose deaths in the U.S. have continued to climb despite rising treatment admissions, with Black men and American Indian/Native Alaskan men and women hit the hardest by the overdose crisis, according to Penn State's Abenaa Jones, the Ann Atherton Early Career Professor in Health and Human Development and assistant professor of human development and family studies, who was lead author on the paper. In the last two decades the crisis has hit hardest in high-distressed neighborhoods, or rural and urban places with low income, a lack of housing, underserved schools, and other factors that would put an individual at a disadvantage simply by living there, said Jones. Racial and ethnic minorities tend to live in these areas at higher rates than white individuals, and the stress caused by living in these adverse environments may lead to substance use as a means to cope. Higher distressed neighborhoods are more likely to see tainted drug supplies than other places, which can lead to the increased likelihood of fatal overdoses. In addition, these areas may lack access to naloxone, the life-saving opioid overdose reversal drug, she added. Other contributors to this work were Riley Shearer, University of Minnesota; Alexis Santos-Lozada, Penn State; Sienna Strong-Jones, Penn State; Noel Vest, Boston University; Daniel Teixeira da Silva, University of Pennsylvania; Utsha Khatri, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai; and Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc, Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute of Minneapolis, and his co-authors. For the study, Winkelman and co-authors analyzed data collected from 1992 to 2017, identifying records for cases of 131,838 pregnant women with opioid use disorder. They drew these from the Treatment Episode Data Set-Admissions (TEDS-A) program, an annual national survey conducted by the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). More than half — 63.3% — percent of the women in the sample studied were between the ages aged 18–29.
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota (Blue Cross) today announced that Miaja Cassidy has joined the organization's senior leadership team as chief legal officer. In her role, Cassidy oversees the management of all Blue Cross legal services as well as compliance, audit, and public affairs. The position reports directly to Dana Erickson, company president and CEO. Cassidy comes to Blue Cross with more than 25 years of experience in risk management, regulatory affairs and compliance, enterprise transformation and general counsel. In addition to her independent consulting work for healthcare clients throughout the country, Cassidy had held various leadership positions at prominent Minnesota-based organizations. "I am excited to have Miaja join our efforts in building an even more responsive, efficient and high-performing organization that delivers on our promises to ensure that high quality care is accessible and affordable for all," said Erickson. "Miaja is an accomplished leader with a deep understanding of legal and compliance issues throughout the healthcare industry. She is well-known for her highly collaborative style and for delivering optimal results with integrity. I look forward to Miaja playing an integral role in advocating for the interests of our 2.5 million members."
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota (Blue Cross) today announced that Miaja Cassidy has joined the organization's senior leadership team as chief legal officer. In her role, Cassidy oversees the management of all Blue Cross legal services as well as compliance, audit, and public affairs. The position reports directly to Dana Erickson, company president and CEO. Cassidy comes to Blue Cross with more than 25 years of experience in risk management, regulatory affairs and compliance, enterprise transformation and general counsel. In addition to her independent consulting work for healthcare clients throughout the country, Cassidy had held various leadership positions at prominent Minnesota-based organizations. At Medtronic, Cassidy acted as chief compliance officer and led large-scale compliance programs and activities across a global workforce of 90,000 employees. Additionally, she has overseen legal and compliance initiatives for the clinic and pharmacy operations at Target Corp.; served as the chief risk and compliance officer for Hennepin Healthcare Systems, Inc.; and provided compliance support and legal counsel for Medica, a regional non-profit health plan. Cassidy holds a bachelor's degree in business, economics, and finance from the University of Minnesota and a J.D. from Drake University Law School. She is a Certified Healthcare Compliance Professional (CHP) and a Certified Compliance and Ethics Professional (CCEP). Cassidy currently serves on the boards of Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, Steven Rummler Hope Network and March of Dimes Minnesota. She is an advisory board member for both OptimEyes AI, a San Diego-based risk modeling software company; and MedBlob, a clinical data platform headquartered in Boston. Cassidy sits on the Diversity and Inclusion Working Group of the Society for Corporate Compliance and Ethics (SCCE) and Healthcare Compliance Association (HCCA).
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota (Blue Cross) today announced that Miaja Cassidy has joined the organization's senior leadership team as chief legal officer. In her role, Cassidy oversees the management of all Blue Cross legal services as well as compliance, audit, and public affairs. The position reports directly to Dana Erickson, company president and CEO. Cassidy comes to Blue Cross with more than 25 years of experience in risk management, regulatory affairs and compliance, enterprise transformation and general counsel. In addition to her independent consulting work for healthcare clients throughout the country, Cassidy had held various leadership positions at prominent Minnesota-based organizations. At Medtronic, Cassidy acted as chief compliance officer and led large-scale compliance programs and activities across a global workforce of 90,000 employees. Additionally, she has overseen legal and compliance initiatives for the clinic and pharmacy operations at Target Corp.; served as the chief risk and compliance officer for Hennepin Healthcare Systems, Inc.; and provided compliance support and legal counsel for Medica, a regional non-profit health plan. Cassidy holds a bachelor's degree in business, economics, and finance from the University of Minnesota and a J.D. from Drake University Law School. She is a Certified Healthcare Compliance Professional (CHP) and a Certified Compliance and Ethics Professional (CCEP). Cassidy currently serves on the boards of Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, Steven Rummler Hope Network and March of Dimes Minnesota. She is an advisory board member for both OptimEyes AI, a San Diego-based risk modeling software company; and MedBlob, a clinical data platform headquartered in Boston. Cassidy sits on the Diversity and Inclusion Working Group of the Society for Corporate Compliance and Ethics (SCCE) and Healthcare Compliance Association (HCCA).
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota (Blue Cross) today announced that Miaja Cassidy has joined the organization's senior leadership team as chief legal officer. In her role, Cassidy oversees the management of all Blue Cross legal services as well as compliance, audit, and public affairs. The position reports directly to Dana Erickson, company president and CEO. Cassidy comes to Blue Cross with more than 25 years of experience in risk management, regulatory affairs and compliance, enterprise transformation and general counsel. In addition to her independent consulting work for healthcare clients throughout the country, Cassidy had held various leadership positions at prominent Minnesota-based organizations. At Medtronic, Cassidy acted as chief compliance officer and led large-scale compliance programs and activities across a global workforce of 90,000 employees. Additionally, she has overseen legal and compliance initiatives for the clinic and pharmacy operations at Target Corp.; served as the chief risk and compliance officer for Hennepin Healthcare Systems, Inc.; and provided compliance support and legal counsel for Medica, a regional non-profit health plan. Cassidy holds a bachelor's degree in business, economics, and finance from the University of Minnesota and a J.D. from Drake University Law School. She is a Certified Healthcare Compliance Professional (CHP) and a Certified Compliance and Ethics Professional (CCEP). Cassidy currently serves on the boards of Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, Steven Rummler Hope Network and March of Dimes Minnesota. She is an advisory board member for both OptimEyes AI, a San Diego-based risk modeling software company; and MedBlob, a clinical data platform headquartered in Boston. Cassidy sits on the Diversity and Inclusion Working Group of the Society for Corporate Compliance and Ethics (SCCE) and Healthcare Compliance Association (HCCA).
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota (Blue Cross) today announced that Miaja Cassidy has joined the organization's senior leadership team as chief legal officer. In her role, Cassidy oversees the management of all Blue Cross legal services as well as compliance, audit, and public affairs. The position reports directly to Dana Erickson, company president and CEO. Cassidy comes to Blue Cross with more than 25 years of experience in risk management, regulatory affairs and compliance, enterprise transformation and general counsel. In addition to her independent consulting work for healthcare clients throughout the country, Cassidy had held various leadership positions at prominent Minnesota-based organizations. At Medtronic, Cassidy acted as chief compliance officer and led large-scale compliance programs and activities across a global workforce of 90,000 employees. Additionally, she has overseen legal and compliance initiatives for the clinic and pharmacy operations at Target Corp.; served as the chief risk and compliance officer for Hennepin Healthcare Systems, Inc.; and provided compliance support and legal counsel for Medica, a regional non-profit health plan. Cassidy holds a bachelor's degree in business, economics, and finance from the University of Minnesota and a J.D. from Drake University Law School. She is a Certified Healthcare Compliance Professional (CHP) and a Certified Compliance and Ethics Professional (CCEP). Cassidy currently serves on the boards of Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, Steven Rummler Hope Network and March of Dimes Minnesota. She is an advisory board member for both OptimEyes AI, a San Diego-based risk modeling software company; and MedBlob, a clinical data platform headquartered in Boston. Cassidy sits on the Diversity and Inclusion Working Group of the Society for Corporate Compliance and Ethics (SCCE) and Healthcare Compliance Association (HCCA).
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota (Blue Cross) today announced that Miaja Cassidy has joined the organization's senior leadership team as chief legal officer. In her role, Cassidy oversees the management of all Blue Cross legal services as well as compliance, audit, and public affairs. The position reports directly to Dana Erickson, company president and CEO. Cassidy comes to Blue Cross with more than 25 years of experience in risk management, regulatory affairs and compliance, enterprise transformation and general counsel. In addition to her independent consulting work for healthcare clients throughout the country, Cassidy had held various leadership positions at prominent Minnesota-based organizations. At Medtronic, Cassidy acted as chief compliance officer and led large-scale compliance programs and activities across a global workforce of 90,000 employees. Additionally, she has overseen legal and compliance initiatives for the clinic and pharmacy operations at Target Corp.; served as the chief risk and compliance officer for Hennepin Healthcare Systems, Inc.; and provided compliance support and legal counsel for Medica, a regional non-profit health plan. Cassidy holds a bachelor's degree in business, economics, and finance from the University of Minnesota and a J.D. from Drake University Law School. She is a Certified Healthcare Compliance Professional (CHP) and a Certified Compliance and Ethics Professional (CCEP). Cassidy currently serves on the boards of Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, Steven Rummler Hope Network and March of Dimes Minnesota. She is an advisory board member for both OptimEyes AI, a San Diego-based risk modeling software company; and MedBlob, a clinical data platform headquartered in Boston. Cassidy sits on the Diversity and Inclusion Working Group of the Society for Corporate Compliance and Ethics (SCCE) and Healthcare Compliance Association (HCCA).
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota (Blue Cross) today announced that Miaja Cassidy has joined the organization's senior leadership team as chief legal officer. In her role, Cassidy oversees the management of all Blue Cross legal services as well as compliance, audit, and public affairs. The position reports directly to Dana Erickson, company president and CEO. Cassidy comes to Blue Cross with more than 25 years of experience in risk management, regulatory affairs and compliance, enterprise transformation and general counsel. In addition to her independent consulting work for healthcare clients throughout the country, Cassidy had held various leadership positions at prominent Minnesota-based organizations. At Medtronic, Cassidy acted as chief compliance officer and led large-scale compliance programs and activities across a global workforce of 90,000 employees. Additionally, she has overseen legal and compliance initiatives for the clinic and pharmacy operations at Target Corp.; served as the chief risk and compliance officer for Hennepin Healthcare Systems, Inc.; and provided compliance support and legal counsel for Medica, a regional non-profit health plan. Cassidy holds a bachelor's degree in business, economics, and finance from the University of Minnesota and a J.D. from Drake University Law School. She is a Certified Healthcare Compliance Professional (CHP) and a Certified Compliance and Ethics Professional (CCEP). Cassidy currently serves on the boards of Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, Steven Rummler Hope Network and March of Dimes Minnesota. She is an advisory board member for both OptimEyes AI, a San Diego-based risk modeling software company; and MedBlob, a clinical data platform headquartered in Boston. Cassidy sits on the Diversity and Inclusion Working Group of the Society for Corporate Compliance and Ethics (SCCE) and Healthcare Compliance Association (HCCA).
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota (Blue Cross) today announced that Miaja Cassidy has joined the organization's senior leadership team as chief legal officer. In her role, Cassidy oversees the management of all Blue Cross legal services as well as compliance, audit, and public affairs. The position reports directly to Dana Erickson, company president and CEO. Cassidy comes to Blue Cross with more than 25 years of experience in risk management, regulatory affairs and compliance, enterprise transformation and general counsel. In addition to her independent consulting work for healthcare clients throughout the country, Cassidy had held various leadership positions at prominent Minnesota-based organizations. At Medtronic, Cassidy acted as chief compliance officer and led large-scale compliance programs and activities across a global workforce of 90,000 employees. Additionally, she has overseen legal and compliance initiatives for the clinic and pharmacy operations at Target Corp.; served as the chief risk and compliance officer for Hennepin Healthcare Systems, Inc.; and provided compliance support and legal counsel for Medica, a regional non-profit health plan. Cassidy holds a bachelor's degree in business, economics, and finance from the University of Minnesota and a J.D. from Drake University Law School. She is a Certified Healthcare Compliance Professional (CHP) and a Certified Compliance and Ethics Professional (CCEP). Cassidy currently serves on the boards of Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, Steven Rummler Hope Network and March of Dimes Minnesota. She is an advisory board member for both OptimEyes AI, a San Diego-based risk modeling software company; and MedBlob, a clinical data platform headquartered in Boston. Cassidy sits on the Diversity and Inclusion Working Group of the Society for Corporate Compliance and Ethics (SCCE) and Healthcare Compliance Association (HCCA).
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota (Blue Cross) today announced that Miaja Cassidy has joined the organization's senior leadership team as chief legal officer. In her role, Cassidy oversees the management of all Blue Cross legal services as well as compliance, audit, and public affairs. The position reports directly to Dana Erickson, company president and CEO. Cassidy comes to Blue Cross with more than 25 years of experience in risk management, regulatory affairs and compliance, enterprise transformation and general counsel. In addition to her independent consulting work for healthcare clients throughout the country, Cassidy had held various leadership positions at prominent Minnesota-based organizations. At Medtronic, Cassidy acted as chief compliance officer and led large-scale compliance programs and activities across a global workforce of 90,000 employees. Additionally, she has overseen legal and compliance initiatives for the clinic and pharmacy operations at Target Corp.; served as the chief risk and compliance officer for Hennepin Healthcare Systems, Inc.; and provided compliance support and legal counsel for Medica, a regional non-profit health plan. Cassidy holds a bachelor's degree in business, economics, and finance from the University of Minnesota and a J.D. from Drake University Law School. She is a Certified Healthcare Compliance Professional (CHP) and a Certified Compliance and Ethics Professional (CCEP). Cassidy currently serves on the boards of Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, Steven Rummler Hope Network and March of Dimes Minnesota. She is an advisory board member for both OptimEyes AI, a San Diego-based risk modeling software company; and MedBlob, a clinical data platform headquartered in Boston. Cassidy sits on the Diversity and Inclusion Working Group of the Society for Corporate Compliance and Ethics (SCCE) and Healthcare Compliance Association (HCCA).
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota (Blue Cross) today announced that Miaja Cassidy has joined the organization's senior leadership team as chief legal officer. In her role, Cassidy oversees the management of all Blue Cross legal services as well as compliance, audit, and public affairs. The position reports directly to Dana Erickson, company president and CEO. Cassidy comes to Blue Cross with more than 25 years of experience in risk management, regulatory affairs and compliance, enterprise transformation and general counsel. In addition to her independent consulting work for healthcare clients throughout the country, Cassidy had held various leadership positions at prominent Minnesota-based organizations. At Medtronic, Cassidy acted as chief compliance officer and led large-scale compliance programs and activities across a global workforce of 90,000 employees. Additionally, she has overseen legal and compliance initiatives for the clinic and pharmacy operations at Target Corp.; served as the chief risk and compliance officer for Hennepin Healthcare Systems, Inc.; and provided compliance support and legal counsel for Medica, a regional non-profit health plan. Cassidy holds a bachelor's degree in business, economics, and finance from the University of Minnesota and a J.D. from Drake University Law School. She is a Certified Healthcare Compliance Professional (CHP) and a Certified Compliance and Ethics Professional (CCEP). Cassidy currently serves on the boards of Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, Steven Rummler Hope Network and March of Dimes Minnesota. She is an advisory board member for both OptimEyes AI, a San Diego-based risk modeling software company; and MedBlob, a clinical data platform headquartered in Boston. Cassidy sits on the Diversity and Inclusion Working Group of the Society for Corporate Compliance and Ethics (SCCE) and Healthcare Compliance Association (HCCA).
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota (Blue Cross) today announced that Miaja Cassidy has joined the organization's senior leadership team as chief legal officer. In her role, Cassidy oversees the management of all Blue Cross legal services as well as compliance, audit, and public affairs. The position reports directly to Dana Erickson, company president and CEO. Cassidy comes to Blue Cross with more than 25 years of experience in risk management, regulatory affairs and compliance, enterprise transformation and general counsel. In addition to her independent consulting work for healthcare clients throughout the country, Cassidy had held various leadership positions at prominent Minnesota-based organizations. At Medtronic, Cassidy acted as chief compliance officer and led large-scale compliance programs and activities across a global workforce of 90,000 employees. Additionally, she has overseen legal and compliance initiatives for the clinic and pharmacy operations at Target Corp.; served as the chief risk and compliance officer for Hennepin Healthcare Systems, Inc.; and provided compliance support and legal counsel for Medica, a regional non-profit health plan. Cassidy holds a bachelor's degree in business, economics, and finance from the University of Minnesota and a J.D. from Drake University Law School. She is a Certified Healthcare Compliance Professional (CHP) and a Certified Compliance and Ethics Professional (CCEP). Cassidy currently serves on the boards of Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, Steven Rummler Hope Network and March of Dimes Minnesota. She is an advisory board member for both OptimEyes AI, a San Diego-based risk modeling software company; and MedBlob, a clinical data platform headquartered in Boston. Cassidy sits on the Diversity and Inclusion Working Group of the Society for Corporate Compliance and Ethics (SCCE) and Healthcare Compliance Association (HCCA).
Consider a patient who presents to the emergency department with chest pain and shortness of breath. Does she need to be admitted for further evaluation and treatment of myocardial infarction? Or is her risk so low that she can be safely discharged? As emergency department overcrowding becomes a challenge at many hospitals, a rapid test to rule out myocardial infarction shortly after presentation would be immensely valuable, helping to improve patient satisfaction and conserve healthcare resources. High-sensitivity cardiac troponin assays have been evaluated for this purpose, but appropriate thresholds to rule out myocardial infarction at presentation remain to be determined. A new research article appearing in the June 2023 issue of Clinical Chemistry addresses this question by establishing a single measurement rule-out threshold with high sensitivity and negative predictive value for myocardial infarction, as well as 30-day adverse events. In this podcast, we are excited to welcome back the article’s senior author, Dr. Fred Apple. Dr. Apple is the Medical Director of the Clinical and Forensic Toxicology Laboratory and Principal Investigator of the CLIA-certified Cardiac Biomarkers Trial Laboratory at the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute. He is also a member of the ‘Universal Definition of Myocardial Infarction and Myocardial Injury’ Global Task Force. Dr. Apple, could you please start this out by talking about the clinicaltrials.gov SAFETY study?
May
During the month of May, the City of Minneapolis has been busy evicting encampments of unhoused people, displacing hundreds and throwing away many people’s only belongings. Minneapolis Police (MPD) displaced about 80 unhoused people on East Franklin Avenue in South Minneapolis on May 10. Each week since, they’ve evicted several smaller camps erected from those displaced from the Franklin Ave. sweep, continuing a punishing and deadly cycle. “This is what he touts as his great success,” said American Indian Movement member Mike Forcia about Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and homelessness. Forcia spoke to Unicorn Riot while standing in the median of Franklin Ave. amid dozens of tents and unhoused people’s property that were about about to be trashed by authorities. With rising inequality, continued neoliberal policies, and new waves of addictive drugs like fentanyl, the numbers of people struggling with homelessness in Minnesota has risen. The city of Minneapolis has seen an influx of encampments of unhoused people gathering together, notably since the 2018 Wall of the Forgotten Natives. A report released in January by the Minnesota Department of Health and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute —Minnesota Homeless Mortality Report, 2017-2021 (pdf) — found that the death rate of a person experiencing homelessness is three times higher in Minnesota than the general population.
The two largest U.S. health plans share a birthday, July 30, 1965, but they have different roles and public images. A law signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson created Medicare, which serves people age 65 and older, and Medicaid, which covers people considered to be poor by government standards. Both programs also cover people with disabilities, contributing to overlap between Medicaid and Medicare. About 12.2 million people of the about 60 million people enrolled in Medicare in 2018 also had Medicaid coverage. People tend to remain enrolled in Medicare. In 2022, 55.5 million of the the 63.8 million participants were age 65 and older, according to the 2022 Medicare trustees report. The rest of the enrollees qualified due to disabilities. People gain Medicaid coverage when they lose jobs — for instance, during the recession stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic — and drop it when they become employed again. Some people with disabilities also rely on Medicaid coverage while waiting to qualify for Medicare. While Medicaid is a safety-net program for many Americans, Medicare is more of an aspiration, which enjoys a significant base of bipartisan support. Pregnant women referred by courts and other criminal justice agencies for opioid abuse treatment were more likely to get medications to help them manage their condition if they lived in states that had expanded their Medicaid eligibility, wrote Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc of the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute of Minneapolis, and his co-authors. For the study, Winkelman and co-authors analyzed data collected from 1992 to 2017, identifying records for cases of 131,838 pregnant women with opioid use disorder. They drew these from the Treatment Episode Data Set-Admissions (TEDS-A) program, an annual national survey conducted by the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). More than half — 63.3% — percent of the women in the sample studied were between the ages aged 18–29.
Growing up in public housing projects in Boston, Damon Chaplin got first-hand experience with how a neighborhood can harm your health. Researchers use the phrase “social determinants of health” to describe the conditions that people are born into—and those determinants were a challenge for Chaplin. He was often rushed to the emergency room for his asthma, which was exacerbated by an incinerator and cigarette smoke in his building. Now, as a health-care leader, Chaplin likes to refer to the social determinants of health as the social determinants of hope. The 50-year-old left Massachusetts in March to lead the public health department of Minneapolis. Chaplin said he was eager to come to a city that is working diligently on issues such as health and racial equity, climate change, and social reform. Housing—or lack of it—is one of the key social determinants he’ll be tackling here. A recent Minnesota Department of Health and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute report found that people experiencing homelessness die at a rate three times higher than the general population. In other words, a 20-year-old unhoused person is as likely to die as a 50-year-old in the general population.
Growing up in public housing projects in Boston, Damon Chaplin got first-hand experience with how a neighborhood can harm your health. Researchers use the phrase “social determinants of health” to describe the conditions that people are born into—and those determinants were a challenge for Chaplin. He was often rushed to the emergency room for his asthma, which was exacerbated by an incinerator and cigarette smoke in his building. Now, as a health-care leader, Chaplin likes to refer to the social determinants of health as the social determinants of hope. The 50-year-old left Massachusetts in March to lead the public health department of Minneapolis. Chaplin said he was eager to come to a city that is working diligently on issues such as health and racial equity, climate change, and social reform. Housing—or lack of it—is one of the key social determinants he’ll be tackling here. A recent Minnesota Department of Health and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute report found that people experiencing homelessness die at a rate three times higher than the general population. In other words, a 20-year-old unhoused person is as likely to die as a 50-year-old in the general population.
Steaming heaps of barbeque ribs and chicken — along with fruit salad, roast vegetables and cheesy potatoes — awaited clusters of people gathered for lunch. Steady meals are among the services offered at the Richard M. Schulze Family Foundation St. Paul Opportunity Center in St. Paul as people experience housing challenges and the ongoing effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Currently, volunteer groups from 28 Catholic parishes and two Catholic schools within the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis participate regularly to support Catholic Charities’ offerings at the St. Paul Opportunity Center. Catholic Charities Twin Cities programs assist more than 20,000 people per year, including 10,000 who seek support at the nonprofit’s four emergency shelters and two day centers. The St. Paul Opportunity Center — which serves about 1,000 people per day — offers meals, shelter, employment and housing resources, social services, financial assistance programs, veterans services and medical care, among other services. The St. Paul Opportunity Center also has 177 units (77 efficiency apartments and 100 single-occupancy units) of permanent housing on site. Higher Ground St. Paul offers overnight and emergency shelter as well as permanent housing — its two floors of shelter have capacity for 356 people and its three floors of housing include 193 single-occupancy units. According to Michael Goar, president and CEO of Catholic Charities Twin Cities, the nonprofit organization is one of the only providers in the Twin Cities of both overnight and daytime shelter and services — including hot meals, showers and laundry services as well as storage locker access. In its 2022 Annual Homelessness Assessment Report, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development determined that, on a single night in January 2022, the total number of people experiencing homelessness nationwide was 582,462. Of that total, 60% were sheltered — meaning, in “emergency shelters, safe havens or transitional housing programs”— and 40% were unsheltered — meaning, “on the street, in abandoned buildings, or in other places not suitable for human habitation.” Meanwhile, a key finding from a report the Minnesota Department of Health and the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute partnered to release in January 2023 was that those who experience homelessness face an earlier and greater risk of death regardless of age, gender or race — the death rate is triple that of the general Minnesota population.
April
Hennepin Healthcare’s Talent Garden series continues its successful outreach to young people with its American Indian Youth with Stethoscopes Summit on Saturday, April 15 from 9-3:15 p.m. American Indian men and women ages 12-18 who are interested in learning about healthcare careers have filled all of the slots for this summit – the first one that is specific for American Indian youth. Panelists also include Dr. Casey Dorr from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, and medical students of the U of M Med School chapter of ANAMS (the Association of Native American Medical Students) whose U of M chapter leaders have embraced the event and will also escort students throughout the day.
March
The ongoing opioid epidemic has hit some groups of Minnesotans harder than others: The crisis has had the most disproportionate impact on the state’s American Indian population, followed by Black Minnesotans. In 2021, for example, American Indians were almost nine times more likely to die from a drug overdose than whites, and Black Minnesotans were three times as likely to die from a drug overdose as whites. In response to these disturbing disparities, staff at the Minnesota Department of Human Services (DHS), in collaboration with members of the Walz-Flanagan administration, set out to speak to members of the most affected cultural groups to learn how to address the problem. The Minnesota Department of Health, in partnership with Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, recently released a study that took a comprehensive look at the mortality of individuals facing housing insecurity and unsheltered homelessness and found the staggering result that one in 10 opioid deaths in Minnesota is a person facing housing instability and that one in three deaths of someone experiencing homelessness is an overdose.
Doxycycline post-exposure prophylaxis (doxyPEP) after sex is highly effective for preventing bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STIs) among gay men and transgender women—and adding a vaccine reduces the risk for gonorrhea—but this approach did not work well for cisgender women in Africa, according to research presented at the 30th Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI).
DoxyPEP Plus Vaccine
As reported at last summer’s international AIDS Conference, the DoxyPEP study enrolled gay men and transgender women living with HIV in San Francisco and Seattle. It found that those who took a 200 milligram dose of the antibiotic doxycycline within 72 hours after condomless sex saw a 74% reduction in the risk for chlamydia, a 57% decrease for gonorrhea and a 77% reduction for syphilis per quarter. Among HIV-negative participants on pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), the corresponding reductions were 88%, 55% and 87%, respectively.
DoxyPEP for Women
Effective bacterial STI prevention for women is urgently needed as infections can lead to severe complications including pelvic inflammatory disease, chronic pain, infertility, pregnancy complications and increased susceptibility to HIV, presenter Jennell Stewart, DO, MPH, of the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in Minneapolis, noted as background. The dPEP Kenya trial was conducted in Kisumu an area with high STI rates and a high prevalence of antibiotic-resistant gonorrhea. The trial, which ran from 2020 through 2022, enrolled 449 nonpregnant cisgender women ages 18 to 30 who were taking HIV PrEP. About 60% were using hormonal contraception, and 37% reported transactional sex. At baseline, 18% had a bacterial STI, mostly chlamydia.
Doxycycline post-exposure prophylaxis (doxyPEP) after sex is highly effective for preventing bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STIs) among gay men and transgender women—and adding a vaccine reduces the risk for gonorrhea—but this approach did not work well for cisgender women in Africa, according to research presented at the 30th Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI).
DoxyPEP Plus Vaccine
As reported at last summer’s international AIDS Conference, the DoxyPEP study enrolled gay men and transgender women living with HIV in San Francisco and Seattle. It found that those who took a 200 milligram dose of the antibiotic doxycycline within 72 hours after condomless sex saw a 74% reduction in the risk for chlamydia, a 57% decrease for gonorrhea and a 77% reduction for syphilis per quarter. Among HIV-negative participants on pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), the corresponding reductions were 88%, 55% and 87%, respectively.
DoxyPEP for Women
Effective bacterial STI prevention for women is urgently needed as infections can lead to severe complications including pelvic inflammatory disease, chronic pain, infertility, pregnancy complications and increased susceptibility to HIV, presenter Jennell Stewart, DO, MPH, of the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in Minneapolis, noted as background. The dPEP Kenya trial was conducted in Kisumu an area with high STI rates and a high prevalence of antibiotic-resistant gonorrhea. The trial, which ran from 2020 through 2022, enrolled 449 nonpregnant cisgender women ages 18 to 30 who were taking HIV PrEP. About 60% were using hormonal contraception, and 37% reported transactional sex. At baseline, 18% had a bacterial STI, mostly chlamydia.
Doxycycline post-exposure prophylaxis (doxyPEP) after sex is highly effective for preventing bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STIs) among gay men and transgender women—and adding a vaccine reduces the risk for gonorrhea—but this approach did not work well for cisgender women in Africa, according to research presented at the 30th Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI).
DoxyPEP Plus Vaccine
As reported at last summer’s international AIDS Conference, the DoxyPEP study enrolled gay men and transgender women living with HIV in San Francisco and Seattle. It found that those who took a 200 milligram dose of the antibiotic doxycycline within 72 hours after condomless sex saw a 74% reduction in the risk for chlamydia, a 57% decrease for gonorrhea and a 77% reduction for syphilis per quarter. Among HIV-negative participants on pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), the corresponding reductions were 88%, 55% and 87%, respectively.
DoxyPEP for Women
Effective bacterial STI prevention for women is urgently needed as infections can lead to severe complications including pelvic inflammatory disease, chronic pain, infertility, pregnancy complications and increased susceptibility to HIV, presenter Jennell Stewart, DO, MPH, of the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in Minneapolis, noted as background. The dPEP Kenya trial was conducted in Kisumu an area with high STI rates and a high prevalence of antibiotic-resistant gonorrhea. The trial, which ran from 2020 through 2022, enrolled 449 nonpregnant cisgender women ages 18 to 30 who were taking HIV PrEP. About 60% were using hormonal contraception, and 37% reported transactional sex. At baseline, 18% had a bacterial STI, mostly chlamydia.
Minnesota's governor, Tim Walz, has proposed a plan to provide financial assistance to 21-year-olds leaving foster care in the state. The Support Beyond 21 program aims to address the current lack of support for young people leaving care and reduce the risks of homelessness, poverty, and incarceration for this vulnerable population. The program, which could serve up to 175 young people per year, is still awaiting approval from the legislature, but if passed, young people in the program would receive monthly payments for a year, with assistance on budgeting and financial literacy to aid their transition to independence.
Advocacy for Foster Youth
The plan for Support Beyond 21 comes as more attention is being paid to the struggles of young people leaving foster care. In a letter sent to Secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development Marcia Fudge, Minnesota senators Amy Klobuchar and Susan Collins have urged the department to improve housing security for young adults who are aging out of foster care in the next two years or have already done so since 2019. The senators highlighted the story of a young mother named Ada, who faced multiple short-term rentals and difficulty finding a landlord willing to rent to her even with a HUD voucher.
Urgency for Support
Foster youth advocates say the need to assist this population of young people is urgent. Half of unhoused people nationwide have spent time in foster care, and young people who age out of foster care are at high risk of homelessness, poverty, and incarceration. A report published by the Minnesota Department of Health and the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute found that a 20-year-old experiencing homelessness has the same likelihood of death as a 50-year-old in the general population. The Support Beyond 21 program is intended to help address these issues and provide young people leaving foster care with a smoother transition to independence.
Vowing to make Minnesota “the best state in the country for kids to grow up” in, Gov. Tim Walz (D) is proposing monthly payments for 21-year-olds leaving foster care. The plan is driven by young people and advocacy groups lamenting the current “abrupt end to financial support,” according to the governor’s recent budget recommendation. The Support Beyond 21 program is being considered by the Minnesota Legislature as some U.S. lawmakers call for more attention to this vulnerable population. Gov. Walz’s cash assistance proposal, included in his $12 billion package presented in January, could provide some relief. If approved this legislative session, foster youth enrolled in Support Beyond 21 would receive monthly payments for a year. The amounts, which are still to be determined, would gradually diminish every three months. But participants would be assisted with budgeting and financial literacy to plan for their future independence. The program is expected to serve approximately 175 youth statewide per year. Foster youth advocates say the need to assist this population of young people is urgent. Half of unhoused people nationwide have spent time in foster care, according to the National Foster Youth Institute. A report published by the Minnesota Department of Health and the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in January found that a 20-year-old experiencing homelessness has the same likelihood of death as a 50-year-old in the general population.
February
Researchers from the University of Washington (UW), Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI), and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI) announced results at CROI from a clinical trial demonstrating that doxycycline taken after sex does not prevent bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STIs) – chlamydia or gonorrhea – among cisgender women. The dPEP Kenya Trial was conducted in Kisumu, Kenya, to evaluate the effectiveness of doxycycline postexposure prophylaxis (PEP) to prevent bacterial STIs. “Doxycycline PEP didn’t work for cisgender women… but the need for STI prevention is increasing around the world,” said Dr. Jenell Stewart, the dPEP Kenya Study Director, Infectious Disease Physician at Hennepin Healthcare and University of Minnesota. Biological differences between the vagina/cervix and rectum may explain why doxycycline didn’t prevent STIs in cisgender women; however, the approach to treatment of STIs doesn’t differ by sex. Antibiotic resistance offers an explanation for why gonorrhea wasn’t prevented, but it doesn’t explain why chlamydia wasn’t prevented.
Researchers from the University of Washington (UW), Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI), and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI) announced results at CROI from a clinical trial demonstrating that doxycycline taken after sex does not prevent bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STIs) – chlamydia or gonorrhea – among cisgender women. The dPEP Kenya Trial was conducted in Kisumu, Kenya, to evaluate the effectiveness of doxycycline postexposure prophylaxis (PEP) to prevent bacterial STIs. The results of the study have been highly anticipated, as this is the first study of doxycycline PEP among cisgender women, following multiple studies that showed a high level of STI protection with doxycycline use among cisgender men and transgender women in France and the United States. Differences in anatomy, antibiotic resistance, and adherence offer possible explanations for the lack of efficacy among cisgender women when it worked for cisgender men and transgender women, and the research team is working to understand the potential role of these differences. “Doxycycline PEP didn’t work for cisgender women in Kenya, but the need for STI prevention is increasing around the world,” said Dr. Jenell Stewart, the dPEP Kenya Study Director, Infectious Disease Physician at Hennepin Healthcare and University of Minnesota. Antibiotic resistance offers an explanation for why gonorrhea wasn’t prevented, but it doesn’t explain why chlamydia wasn’t prevented. There are no known cases of antibiotic resistant chlamydia; however, the rate of doxycycline resistant gonorrhea was very high, including 100% of the infections acquired prior to starting the study. Self-reported adherence was high but imperfect and frequency and timing of doxycycline use among cisgender women in the trial is being evaluated further. All participants were also taking daily HIV PrEP pills (a medicine to prevent HIV), and none of the participants got HIV during the year they were in the study.
Doxycycline post-exposure prophylaxis (doxyPEP), which was found to be highly effective at preventing sexually transmitted infections (STIs) among gay men and transgender women, did not protect young cisgender women in Africa, researchers reported on Monday at the 30th Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI 2023) in Seattle. Possible explanations for this “stark contrast” include anatomical differences, variations in antibiotic resistance in the areas where the studies were conducted and suboptimal adherence, according to presenter Dr Jenell Stewart of the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in Minneapolis. Bacterial STIs in women can lead to severe complications including pelvic inflammatory disease, chronic pain, infertility, pregnancy complications and increased susceptibility to HIV, so effective prevention interventions are urgently needed. The trial, conducted from 2020 through 2022, enrolled 449 non-pregnant cisgender women aged 18 to 30 who were taking HIV PrEP. They were randomly assigned to take doxycycline after sex or receive standard care (quarterly STI testing and treatment after diagnosis). Each week, the women received text messages asking about the frequency of sex and doxycycline use, and they were tested for STIs quarterly. Doxycycline was generally safe and well tolerated, with no severe adverse reactions reported. There were no new cases of HIV in either group. Four women reported “social harms” related to doxyPEP use, including verbal or physical violence. Stewart noted that endocervical tissue may differ from urethral, rectal and throat tissue in terms of drug levels. However, another study presented at the same session suggests this is not an adequate explanation.
Researchers from the University of Washington (UW), Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI), and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI) announced results at CROI from a clinical trial demonstrating that doxycycline taken after sex does not prevent bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STIs) – chlamydia or gonorrhea – among cisgender women. The dPEP Kenya Trial was conducted in Kisumu, Kenya, to evaluate the effectiveness of doxycycline postexposure prophylaxis (PEP) to prevent bacterial STIs. The results of the study have been highly anticipated, as this is the first study of doxycycline PEP among cisgender women, following multiple studies that showed a high level of STI protection with doxycycline use among cisgender men and transgender women in France and the United States. Differences in anatomy, antibiotic resistance, and adherence offer possible explanations for the lack of efficacy among cisgender women when it worked for cisgender men and transgender women, and the research team is working to understand the potential role of these differences. “Doxycycline PEP didn’t work for cisgender women in Kenya, but the need for STI prevention is increasing around the world,” said Dr. Jenell Stewart, the dPEP Kenya Study Director, Infectious Disease Physician at Hennepin Healthcare and University of Minnesota. Bacterial STIs in women can lead to lasting and severe consequences including pelvic inflammatory disease, chronic pain, infertility, pregnancy complications, and increased susceptibility to HIV. While the study team continues to investigate the potential role of biological and behavioral differences to explain why doxycycline PEP did not work, it is clear that cisgender women need primary STI prevention strategies.
Researchers from the University of Washington (UW), Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI), and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI) announced results at CROI from a clinical trial demonstrating that doxycycline taken after sex does not prevent bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STIs)—chlamydia or gonorrhea—among cisgender women. The dPEP Kenya Trial was conducted in Kisumu, Kenya, to evaluate the effectiveness of doxycycline postexposure prophylaxis (PEP) to prevent bacterial STIs. The results of the study have been highly anticipated, as this is the first study of doxycycline PEP among cisgender women, following multiple studies that showed a high level of STI protection with doxycycline use among cisgender men and transgender women in France and the United States. Differences in anatomy, antibiotic resistance, and adherence offer possible explanations for the lack of efficacy among cisgender women when it worked for cisgender men and transgender women, and the research team is working to understand the potential role of these differences. “Doxycycline PEP didn’t work for cisgender women in Kenya, but the need for STI prevention is increasing around the world,” said Dr. Jenell Stewart, the dPEP Kenya Study Director, Infectious Disease Physician at Hennepin Healthcare and University of Minnesota. Bacterial STIs in women can lead to lasting and severe consequences including pelvic inflammatory disease, chronic pain, infertility, pregnancy complications, and increased susceptibility to HIV. While the study team continues to investigate the potential role of biological and behavioral differences to explain why doxycycline PEP did not work, it is clear that cisgender women need primary STI prevention strategies.
Researchers from the University of Washington (UW), Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI), and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI) announced results at CROI from a clinical trial demonstrating that doxycycline taken after sex does not prevent bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STIs) – chlamydia or gonorrhea – among cisgender women. The dPEP Kenya Trial was conducted in Kisumu, Kenya, to evaluate the effectiveness of doxycycline postexposure prophylaxis (PEP) to prevent bacterial STIs. The results of the study have been highly anticipated, as this is the first study of doxycycline PEP among cisgender women, following multiple studies that showed a high level of STI protection with doxycycline use among cisgender men and transgender women in France and the United States. Differences in anatomy, antibiotic resistance, and adherence offer possible explanations for the lack of efficacy among cisgender women when it worked for cisgender men and transgender women, and the research team is working to understand the potential role of these differences. “Doxycycline PEP didn’t work for cisgender women in Kenya, but the need for STI prevention is increasing around the world,” said Dr. Jenell Stewart, the dPEP Kenya Study Director, Infectious Disease Physician at Hennepin Healthcare and University of Minnesota. Bacterial STIs in women can lead to lasting and severe consequences including pelvic inflammatory disease, chronic pain, infertility, pregnancy complications, and increased susceptibility to HIV. While the study team continues to investigate the potential role of biological and behavioral differences to explain why doxycycline PEP did not work, it is clear that cisgender women need primary STI prevention strategies.
Researchers from the University of Washington (UW), Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI), and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI) announced results at CROI from a clinical trial demonstrating that doxycycline taken after sex does not prevent bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STIs) – chlamydia or gonorrhea – among cisgender women. The dPEP Kenya Trial was conducted in Kisumu, Kenya, to evaluate the effectiveness of doxycycline postexposure prophylaxis (PEP) to prevent bacterial STIs. The results of the study have been highly anticipated, as this is the first study of doxycycline PEP among cisgender women, following multiple studies that showed a high level of STI protection with doxycycline use among cisgender men and transgender women in France and the United States. Differences in anatomy, antibiotic resistance, and adherence offer possible explanations for the lack of efficacy among cisgender women when it worked for cisgender men and transgender women, and the research team is working to understand the potential role of these differences. “Doxycycline PEP didn’t work for cisgender women in Kenya, but the need for STI prevention is increasing around the world,” said Dr. Jenell Stewart, the dPEP Kenya Study Director, Infectious Disease Physician at Hennepin Healthcare and University of Minnesota. Bacterial STIs in women can lead to lasting and severe consequences including pelvic inflammatory disease, chronic pain, infertility, pregnancy complications, and increased susceptibility to HIV. While the study team continues to investigate the potential role of biological and behavioral differences to explain why doxycycline PEP did not work, it is clear that cisgender women need primary STI prevention strategies.
Researchers from the University of Washington (UW), Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI), and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI) announced results at CROI from a clinical trial demonstrating that doxycycline taken after sex does not prevent bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STIs) – chlamydia or gonorrhea – among cisgender women. The dPEP Kenya Trial was conducted in Kisumu, Kenya, to evaluate the effectiveness of doxycycline postexposure prophylaxis (PEP) to prevent bacterial STIs. The results of the study have been highly anticipated, as this is the first study of doxycycline PEP among cisgender women, following multiple studies that showed a high level of STI protection with doxycycline use among cisgender men and transgender women in France and the United States. Differences in anatomy, antibiotic resistance, and adherence offer possible explanations for the lack of efficacy among cisgender women when it worked for cisgender men and transgender women, and the research team is working to understand the potential role of these differences. “Doxycycline PEP didn’t work for cisgender women in Kenya, but the need for STI prevention is increasing around the world,” said Dr. Jenell Stewart, the dPEP Kenya Study Director, Infectious Disease Physician at Hennepin Healthcare and University of Minnesota. Bacterial STIs in women can lead to lasting and severe consequences including pelvic inflammatory disease, chronic pain, infertility, pregnancy complications, and increased susceptibility to HIV. While the study team continues to investigate the potential role of biological and behavioral differences to explain why doxycycline PEP did not work, it is clear that cisgender women need primary STI prevention strategies.
Researchers from the University of Washington (UW), Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI), and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI) announced results at CROI from a clinical trial demonstrating that doxycycline taken after sex does not prevent bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STIs) – chlamydia or gonorrhea – among cisgender women. The dPEP Kenya Trial was conducted in Kisumu, Kenya, to evaluate the effectiveness of doxycycline postexposure prophylaxis (PEP) to prevent bacterial STIs. The results of the study have been highly anticipated, as this is the first study of doxycycline PEP among cisgender women, following multiple studies that showed a high level of STI protection with doxycycline use among cisgender men and transgender women in France and the United States. Differences in anatomy, antibiotic resistance, and adherence offer possible explanations for the lack of efficacy among cisgender women when it worked for cisgender men and transgender women, and the research team is working to understand the potential role of these differences. "Doxycycline PEP didn't work for cisgender women in Kenya, but the need for STI prevention is increasing around the world," said Dr. Jenell Stewart, the dPEP Kenya Study Director, Infectious Disease Physician at Hennepin Healthcare and University of Minnesota. Bacterial STIs in women can lead to lasting and severe consequences including pelvic inflammatory disease, chronic pain, infertility, pregnancy complications, and increased susceptibility to HIV. While the study team continues to investigate the potential role of biological and behavioral differences to explain why doxycycline PEP did not work, it is clear that cisgender women need primary STI prevention strategies.
Researchers from the University of Washington (UW), Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI), and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI) announced results at CROI from a clinical trial demonstrating that doxycycline taken after sex does not prevent bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STIs)—chlamydia or gonorrhea—among cisgender women. The dPEP Kenya Trial was conducted in Kisumu, Kenya, to evaluate the effectiveness of doxycycline postexposure prophylaxis (PEP) to prevent bacterial STIs. The results of the study have been highly anticipated, as this is the first study of doxycycline PEP among cisgender women, following multiple studies that showed a high level of STI protection with doxycycline use among cisgender men and transgender women in France and the United States. Differences in anatomy, antibiotic resistance, and adherence offer possible explanations for the lack of efficacy among cisgender women when it worked for cisgender men and transgender women, and the research team is working to understand the potential role of these differences. "Doxycycline PEP didn't work for cisgender women in Kenya, but the need for STI prevention is increasing around the world," said Dr. Jenell Stewart, the dPEP Kenya Study Director, Infectious Disease Physician at Hennepin Healthcare and University of Minnesota. Self-reported adherence was high but imperfect and frequency and timing of doxycycline use among cisgender women in the trial is being evaluated further. All participants were also taking daily HIV PrEP pills (a medicine to prevent HIV), and none of the participants got HIV during the year they were in the study.
Researchers from the University of Washington (UW), Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI), and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI) announced results at CROI from a clinical trial demonstrating that doxycycline taken after sex does not prevent bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STIs) – chlamydia or gonorrhea – among cisgender women. The dPEP Kenya Trial was conducted in Kisumu, Kenya, to evaluate the effectiveness of doxycycline postexposure prophylaxis (PEP) to prevent bacterial STIs. The results of the study have been highly anticipated, as this is the first study of doxycycline PEP among cisgender women, following multiple studies that showed a high level of STI protection with doxycycline use among cisgender men and transgender women in France and the United States. Differences in anatomy, antibiotic resistance, and adherence offer possible explanations for the lack of efficacy among cisgender women when it worked for cisgender men and transgender women, and the research team is working to understand the potential role of these differences. “Doxycycline PEP didn’t work for cisgender women in Kenya, but the need for STI prevention is increasing around the world,” said Dr. Jenell Stewart, the dPEP Kenya Study Director, Infectious Disease Physician at Hennepin Healthcare and University of Minnesota. Bacterial STIs in women can lead to lasting and severe consequences including pelvic inflammatory disease, chronic pain, infertility, pregnancy complications, and increased susceptibility to HIV. While the study team continues to investigate the potential role of biological and behavioral differences to explain why doxycycline PEP did not work, it is clear that cisgender women need primary STI prevention strategies.
A new report from the Minnesota Department of Health uncovers the mortality rate of people living without stable housing. Among its most significant findings: people who experience homelessness die at three times the rate of the general population. This comes as shelters and nonprofits supporting those without housing are being stretched thin during what has been a harsh winter. We've also seen several sweeps of encampments. MPR News host Tom Crann spoke about the findings with one of the lead researchers of the report, Dr. Kate Diaz Vickery who is a physician and the co-director of the Health, Homelessness, and Criminal Justice Lab at the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute.
Jonda Crum has a recurring dream in which she is wandering through a deserted town after dark, desperate for a warm place to sleep, but every door in every building is locked and no one can hear her cries for help. The nightmare had become almost a daily reality for Crum, who had been living on the streets and struggling with her addiction for a decade, before a near-fatal medical emergency forced her to seek treatment and stable housing. “Today I’m grateful to be alive,” said Crum of North St. Paul, who provides peer support for people recovering from drug use. “Probably I’ve aged two years for every year I’ve lived on the street.” A major new study shows that homeless people in Minnesota are three times more likely to die than other Minnesotans, and about a third of their deaths are from substance abuse. The study, released last month by the state’s Department of Health, found drug-related deaths among homeless Minnesotans are 10 times higher than among the state’s overall population. Alarmingly, researchers found that 20-year-olds affected by homelessness in Minnesota are about as likely to die as 50-year-olds in the general population. “What this study shows…is that when a person in our state experiences homelessness, there are tremendous and incredibly detrimental health effects,” said Dr. Kate Diaz Vickery, primary care physician and co-director of a health, homelessness and criminal justice research lab at the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, which produced the report. The report calls for a coordinated effort to elevate housing as a “lifesaving strategy,” though it doesn’t stop analyzing current methods of tackling homelessness. But some Twin Cities-based homeless providers and advocates say the findings raise questions about recurring raids on homeless camps, which they say are making health problems worse by isolating people and making it harder for authorities to reach them.
Shawnta Campbell started a new chapter in her life with the help of Haven Housing’s St. Anne’s Place, an emergency family shelter in north Minneapolis. Campbell and her three children recently moved out of the shelter into a new home. Her 25th birthday is just days away, and she is on track to graduate with a bachelor’s degree in biology. With her mother’s recent passing, Campbell and her children stayed at the shelter for four months due to a lack of family support. She was also leaving an abusive relationship when she became homeless. Campbell said she felt overwhelmed not having consistent doctors and access to medical care while she was homeless. A report published by the Minnesota Department of Health and the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in January underscores Campbell’s concerns and experience, noting that homelessness worsens a person’s health and shortens their life expectancy. The report also found that there were increased rates of death among homeless people in every racial group. According to the report, “Minnesota Homeless Mortality Report, 2017-2021”, a 20-year-old person experiencing homelessness has the same likelihood of death as a 50-year-old in the general population. Researchers described the report as “the first systematic look at mortality among people experiencing homelessness who die in Minnesota.” The report looked at U.S. Census data, death data from the Minnesota Department of Health’s Office of Vital Records, and homelessness services documented by Homelessness Management Information System. Researchers analyzed five years of data. “What we see in looking at race and death is that there are increased rates of deaths for every different race ethnicity group among people experiencing homelessness,” said Dr. Katherine Diaz-Vickery, co-director of the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute and co-principal investigator for the report.
January
Homelessness can be deadly. People who experience homelessness in Minnesota die at triple the rate of the general population, according to a new report produced through a partnership between the Minnesota Department of Health and the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute. That alarming pattern holds true regardless of age, gender or race. The Minnesota Homeless Mortality Report 2017-2021 summarizes data from the first systematic look at mortality among people experiencing homelessness who die in Minnesota.
Homelessness can be deadly. People who experience homelessness in Minnesota die at triple the rate of the general population, according to a new report produced through a partnership between the Minnesota Department of Health and the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute. That alarming pattern holds true regardless of age, gender or race. The Minnesota Homeless Mortality Report 2017-2021 summarizes data from the first systematic look at mortality among people experiencing homelessness who die in Minnesota.
Homelessness can be deadly. People who experience homelessness in Minnesota die at triple the rate of the general population, according to a new report produced through a partnership between the Minnesota Department of Health and the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute. That alarming pattern holds true regardless of age, gender or race. The Minnesota Homeless Mortality Report 2017-2021 summarizes data from the first systematic look at mortality among people experiencing homelessness who die in Minnesota.
Homelessness can be deadly. People who experience homelessness in Minnesota die at triple the rate of the general population, according to a new report produced through a partnership between the Minnesota Department of Health and the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute. That alarming pattern holds true regardless of age, gender or race. The Minnesota Homeless Mortality Report 2017-2021 summarizes data from the first systematic look at mortality among people experiencing homelessness who die in Minnesota.
People who experience homelessness in Minnesota die at much higher rates than the general population, according to a new report produced through a partnership between the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) and the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI). That alarming pattern holds true regardless of age, gender or race. The Minnesota Homeless Mortality Report 2017-2021 summarizes data from the first systematic look at mortality among people experiencing homelessness who die in Minnesota. The Health, Homelessness, and Criminal Justice Lab at HHRI merged Minnesota Homeless Management Information System data on people who used homeless services from 2017 to 2021 with Minnesota state death data and Minnesota population data from 2017 to 2020 from the U.S. Census to compare sociodemographic differences and causes of death. The report and its recommendations can be found at Center of Excellence on Public Health and Homelessness. Dr. Kate Diaz Vickery, co-director of the Health, Homelessness, and Criminal Justice Lab at HHRI, emphasized the importance of better access to housing to improve outcomes. “We were eager to partner with the Minnesota Department of Health to build data systems to document health disparities in this group,” she said. “We especially appreciated the opportunity to partner with people with lived experience in this work. These types of collaborations are essential to our state’s ability to achieve concrete improvements in health and wellness for all, rooted in efforts to improve access to affordable, dignified housing.”
People who experience homelessness in Minnesota die at much higher rates than the general population, according to a new report produced through a partnership between the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) and the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI). That alarming pattern holds true regardless of age, gender or race. The Minnesota Homeless Mortality Report 2017-2021 summarizes data from the first systematic look at mortality among people experiencing homelessness who die in Minnesota. The Health, Homelessness, and Criminal Justice Lab at HHRI merged Minnesota Homeless Management Information System data on people who used homeless services from 2017 to 2021 with Minnesota state death data and Minnesota population data from 2017 to 2020 from the U.S. Census to compare sociodemographic differences and causes of death. The report and its recommendations can be found at Center of Excellence on Public Health and Homelessness. Dr. Kate Diaz Vickery, co-director of the Health, Homelessness, and Criminal Justice Lab at HHRI, emphasized the importance of better access to housing to improve outcomes. “We were eager to partner with the Minnesota Department of Health to build data systems to document health disparities in this group,” she said. “We especially appreciated the opportunity to partner with people with lived experience in this work. These types of collaborations are essential to our state’s ability to achieve concrete improvements in health and wellness for all, rooted in efforts to improve access to affordable, dignified housing.”
People who experience homelessness in Minnesota die at much higher rates than the general population, according to a new report produced through a partnership between the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) and the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI). That alarming pattern holds true regardless of age, gender or race. The Minnesota Homeless Mortality Report 2017-2021 summarizes data from the first systematic look at mortality among people experiencing homelessness who die in Minnesota. The Health, Homelessness, and Criminal Justice Lab at HHRI merged Minnesota Homeless Management Information System data on people who used homeless services from 2017 to 2021 with Minnesota state death data and Minnesota population data from 2017 to 2020 from the U.S. Census to compare sociodemographic differences and causes of death. The report and its recommendations can be found at Center of Excellence on Public Health and Homelessness. Dr. Kate Diaz Vickery, co-director of the Health, Homelessness, and Criminal Justice Lab at HHRI, emphasized the importance of better access to housing to improve outcomes. “We were eager to partner with the Minnesota Department of Health to build data systems to document health disparities in this group,” she said. “We especially appreciated the opportunity to partner with people with lived experience in this work. These types of collaborations are essential to our state’s ability to achieve concrete improvements in health and wellness for all, rooted in efforts to improve access to affordable, dignified housing.”
2022
December
Flu-related hospitalizations declined for the second straight week in Minnesota, offering hope that an influenza season that started early will also end early. While 2,601 patients have been hospitalized for flu already this season — nearly tripling the total in the last two seasons combined — there were only 264 such cases in Minnesota in the week ending Dec. 17. That preliminary total is down from 400 the prior week and nearly 600 in the week before that, according to Thursday's state influenza update. State health leaders said they aren't taking chances, urging vaccinations and vigilance as Minnesota reaches the germ-mixing holiday season. Even in a typical influenza season, an initial wave of infections caused by A strains of the virus in January and February is followed by a second but smaller B-strain wave. A brief issued this week by the Minnesota EHR Consortium, a data analysis partnership of the state's largest hospital systems, found that the state is on track for its worst flu season in seven years, and possibly the last 50 years. "It's not unprecedented to have two separate increases," said Peter Bodurtha, a data scientist at Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, a partner in the consortium. "It really depends on what happens the rest of the year. But being this far ahead of the curve this early, with this much of the season left, that's not a good position to be in." Flu levels were suppressed the past two years by COVID-19 and the public health response to the pandemic, including social distancing and mask wearing. Flu has re-emerged this year in the absence of those practices — and with only steady levels of COVID-19 rather than a wintertime surge.
Among patients with kidney failure who successfully used a permanent access for hemodialysis, the incidence of patency loss was higher with arteriovenous graft use compared with arteriovenous fistula, according to data in Kidney Medicine. “The results suggest that, among patients with a functioning permanent access, arteriovenous fistulas have superior patency compared to arteriovenous grafts, particularly in terms of (primary) assisted patency and secondary patency,” Nicholas S. Roetker, PhD, MS, from the Chronic Kidney Disease Research Group at Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in Minnesota, and colleagues wrote. Researchers derived data from the U.S. Renal Data System (2010 to 2015). There was a 3-year follow-up. Primary outcomes included loss of primary unassisted patency, loss of primary assisted patency and loss of secondary patency. Statistical analysis included incidence curves and HRs adjusted for clinical and sociodemographic factors.
Hennepin Healthcare developed a pain treatment map in partnership with the Minnesota Department of Health that will make it easier for Minnesotans experiencing chronic pain to find safe, opioid-free treatments, to help with healing, working, socializing, and managing daily tasks. Minnesota is now the first state in the country to map out a network of treatments that do not involve narcotics.
November
According to a new study, children exposed to parental incarceration had worse access to primary care and more unmet dental and mental health care needs than their peers, even after accounting for income, insurance status, rurality, and other important factors. With the United States having the highest incarceration rate in the world, these barriers currently place more than 5 million children who have experience the incarceration of a parent at risk of worse mental and physical health outcomes because of poor access to early health interventions. The study was published in Academic Pediatrics and authored by Drs. Rohan Khazanchi, Nia Heard-Garris, and Dr. Tyler Winkelman from Boston Children’s Hospital/Boston Medical Center, Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, and Hennepin Healthcare, respectively. The researchers evaluated the relationships between having an incarcerated parent and health care use and access throughout childhood and adolescence. “While children and adolescents are living with their other parent or caregiver, parental incarceration can disrupt access to care for them through the loss of health insurance and fewer caregivers to help with responsibilities like routine healthcare visits,” explains Dr. Winkelman, the senior author of the study.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, transplantation of COVID-19 infected deceased donor kidneys gradually increased from 2020 to 2021 in the United States, before spiking in the first quarter of 2022, investigators revealed at Kidney Week 2022, the annual meeting of the American Society of Nephrology, in Orlando, Florida. Recipients of COVID-19 positive donor kidneys had no worse graft outcomes than other recipients. A total of 1731 (67.7%) COVID-19 positive kidneys were transplanted, 714 (27.9%) were recovered but not transplanted, and 108 (4.2%) were not recovered at all, Warren McKinney, PhD, of Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, University of Minnesota in Minneapolis reported on behalf of his team. Yet the risks for all-cause graft failure and death did not differ significantly between recipients of COVID-19 positive vs negative donor kidneys, he stated. Cold ischemia times were longer for COVID-19 positive kidneys, however. The team did not examine rates of delayed graft function. He told Renal & Urology News that “high discard rates for COVID-positive donors and greater cold ischemic times may suggest that such donor kidneys remain difficult to place. Patient- and transplant program-level interventions targeting decision support and risk aversion may be necessary to reduce discard rates for COVID-positive donor kidneys.” Co-investigator and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute President, Ajay Israni, MD, MS, added: “Nephrologists should assure transplant candidates that a COVID-19 positive donor kidney can be acceptable. Patients should learn about the transplant center’s criteria for accepting COVID-19 positive donor kidneys at the time of listing, so that they’re not processing this information for the first time at kidney offering, when a rapid response is needed.”
According to a new study, children exposed to parental incarceration had worse access to primary care and more unmet dental and mental health care needs than their peers, even after accounting for income, insurance status, rurality, and other important factors. With the United States having the highest incarceration rate in the world, these barriers currently place more than 5 million children who have experience the incarceration of a parent at risk of worse mental and physical health outcomes because of poor access to early health interventions. The study was published in Academic Pediatrics and authored by Drs. Rohan Khazanchi, Nia Heard-Garris, and Dr. Tyler Winkelman from Boston Children’s Hospital/Boston Medical Center, Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, and Hennepin Healthcare, respectively. The researchers evaluated the relationships between having an incarcerated parent and health care use and access throughout childhood and adolescence. “While children and adolescents are living with their other parent or caregiver, parental incarceration can disrupt access to care for them through the loss of health insurance and fewer caregivers to help with responsibilities like routine healthcare visits,” explains Dr. Winkelman, the senior author of the study.
According to a new study, children exposed to parental incarceration had worse access to primary care and more unmet dental and mental health care needs than their peers, even after accounting for income, insurance status, rurality, and other important factors. With the United States having the highest incarceration rate in the world, these barriers currently place more than 5 million children who have experience the incarceration of a parent at risk of worse mental and physical health outcomes because of poor access to early health interventions. The study was published in Academic Pediatrics and authored by Drs. Rohan Khazanchi, Nia Heard-Garris, and Dr. Tyler Winkelman from Boston Children’s Hospital/Boston Medical Center, Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, and Hennepin Healthcare, respectively. The researchers evaluated the relationships between having an incarcerated parent and health care use and access throughout childhood and adolescence. “While children and adolescents are living with their other parent or caregiver, parental incarceration can disrupt access to care for them through the loss of health insurance and fewer caregivers to help with responsibilities like routine healthcare visits,” explains Dr. Winkelman, the senior author of the study.
According to a new study, children exposed to parental incarceration had worse access to primary care and more unmet dental and mental health care needs than their peers, even after accounting for income, insurance status, rurality, and other important factors. With the United States having the highest incarceration rate in the world, these barriers currently place more than 5 million children who have experience the incarceration of a parent at risk of worse mental and physical health outcomes because of poor access to early health interventions. The study was published in Academic Pediatrics and authored by Drs. Rohan Khazanchi, Nia Heard-Garris, and Dr. Tyler Winkelman from Boston Children’s Hospital/Boston Medical Center, Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, and Hennepin Healthcare, respectively. The researchers evaluated the relationships between having an incarcerated parent and health care use and access throughout childhood and adolescence. “While children and adolescents are living with their other parent or caregiver, parental incarceration can disrupt access to care for them through the loss of health insurance and fewer caregivers to help with responsibilities like routine healthcare visits,” explains Dr. Winkelman, the senior author of the study.
According to a new study, children exposed to parental incarceration had worse access to primary care and more unmet dental and mental health care needs than their peers, even after accounting for income, insurance status, rurality, and other important factors. With the United States having the highest incarceration rate in the world, these barriers currently place more than 5 million children who have experience the incarceration of a parent at risk of worse mental and physical health outcomes because of poor access to early health interventions. The study was published in Academic Pediatrics and authored by Drs. Rohan Khazanchi, Nia Heard-Garris, and Dr. Tyler Winkelman from Boston Children’s Hospital/Boston Medical Center, Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, and Hennepin Healthcare, respectively. The researchers evaluated the relationships between having an incarcerated parent and health care use and access throughout childhood and adolescence. “While children and adolescents are living with their other parent or caregiver, parental incarceration can disrupt access to care for them through the loss of health insurance and fewer caregivers to help with responsibilities like routine healthcare visits,” explains Dr. Winkelman, the senior author of the study.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, transplantation of COVID-19 infected deceased donor kidneys gradually increased from 2020 to 2021 in the United States, before spiking in the first quarter of 2022, investigators revealed at Kidney Week 2022, the annual meeting of the American Society of Nephrology, in Orlando, Florida. Recipients of COVID-19 positive donor kidneys had no worse graft outcomes than other recipients. A total of 1731 (67.7%) COVID-19 positive kidneys were transplanted, 714 (27.9%) were recovered but not transplanted, and 108 (4.2%) were not recovered at all, Warren McKinney, PhD, of Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, University of Minnesota in Minneapolis reported on behalf of his team. He told Renal & Urology News that “high discard rates for COVID-positive donors and greater cold ischemic times may suggest that such donor kidneys remain difficult to place. Patient- and transplant program-level interventions targeting decision support and risk aversion may be necessary to reduce discard rates for COVID-positive donor kidneys.” Co-investigator and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute President, Ajay Israni, MD, MS, added: “Nephrologists should assure transplant candidates that a COVID-19 positive donor kidney can be acceptable. Patients should learn about the transplant center’s criteria for accepting COVID-19 positive donor kidneys at the time of listing, so that they’re not processing this information for the first time at kidney offering, when a rapid response is needed.”
October
Patients suffering a medical cardiac arrest stand a significantly better chance of surviving to discharge neurologically intact from a hospital if they receive a head and shoulder elevation approach to cardiopulmonary resuscitation – especially the if initial treatment using the new approach is started in less than 18 minutes after the 911 call for help is received, according to a new study. A clinical paper published in the scientific journal Resuscitation states that irrespective of initial cardiac rhythm, even Asystole/Pulseless Electrical Activity, ACE-CPR was associated with higher adjusted odds ratios of survival to hospital discharge relative to conventional supine CPR (C-CPR) when initiated within 18 minutes of the call. The researchers who are from HHRI and HHS are:
- Johanna C. Moore, MD, Hennepin Healthcare, Minneapolis, MN; University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN; Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute Minneapolis, MN
- Bayert Salverda, Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute Minneapolis, MN
- Paul Nystrom, MD, Hennepin Healthcare, Minneapolis, MN; Hennepin Healthcare, Minneapolis, MN
- Ryan Quinn, Hennepin Healthcare, Minneapolis, MN
- Keith G Lurie, MD, Hennepin Healthcare, Minneapolis, MN; University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN; Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute Minneapolis, MN
September
In their report, authors Nicholas S Roetker (Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, Minneapolis, USA) and colleagues write that the risks of major bleeding, thrombosis, and cardiovascular events are elevated in patients receiving maintenance haemodialysis. The team’s objective was to compare the risk of these outcomes in haemodialysis patients according to the permanent vascular access type. Using data from the United States Renal Data System (2010–2015), the researchers included in their study patients with kidney failure who were greater than 18 years, had Medicare as the primary payer, were not using an oral anticoagulant, and were newly using an arteriovenous (AV) access for haemodialysis. The investigators acknowledge some limitations of their study, noting for example that the analysis included only patients with a functioning AV access, and that the scope of outcomes considered provides an “incomplete picture” of the risks facing AV access users. “While this analysis was primarily concerned with assessing bleeding, thrombotic, and cardiovascular events, the risk of a variety of other serious clinical outcomes should be considered when choosing a vascular access,” they write. Furthermore, the authors note that their study included Medicare fee-for-service beneficiaries with Part D coverage who were not receiving oral anticoagulation; as such, they comments that “the results may not be generalisable to other kidney failure populations”.
August
Scientists have found that metformin, a commonly prescribed diabetes medication, lowers the odds of emergency department visits, hospitalizations, or death due to COVID-19 by over 40 percent; and over 50 percent if prescribed early in onset of symptoms. The study, which was published on August 18 in the New England Journal of Medicine, also found no positive effect from treatment with either ivermectin or low-dose fluvoxamine. The research was led by the University of Minnesota Medical School and School of Public Health along with others from Hennepin Healthcare and HHRI. “We are pleased to contribute to the body of knowledge around COVID-19 therapies in general, with treatments that are widely available. Our trial suggests that metformin may reduce the likelihood of needing to go to the emergency room or be hospitalized for COVID-19,” said Carolyn Bramante, MD, principal investigator of the study. The clinical trial launched in January 2021 after U of M Medical School scientists identified, through computer modeling and observational studies, that outpatient metformin use appeared to decrease the likelihood of mortality from, or being hospitalized for, COVID-19. Hennepin Healthcare was one of the participating clinical trial sites. Researchers included Mike Puskarich, MD, MS.
The Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute is evaluating an unusual methodology of quitting smoking by allowing participants to wager on themselves and put staunch money. It's miles a fraction of a label-unusual game called QuitBet, which is supported by a National Institutes of Health (NIH) analysis grant that is being administered by scientists at Hennepin Healthcare. Avid gamers wager $30 on themselves, which is added to the pot, and decide to stopping smoking for four weeks. After that, gamers in discovering a free breath checking out tool to video show their day-today development. All the gamers who accumulate been able to pause smoking on the tip divide the pot with the assorted winners, winning inspire their customary wager plus a profit. Most winners who stop smoking double their winnings. Scientific enhance is being given by Sandra Japuntich, Ph.D., a Hennepin Healthcare Investigator. “We’ve known for years that paying of us to alternate behaviors, is known as contingency management, works to wait on of us pause smoking. Alternatively, enforcing contingency management in a sustainable methodology is refined. QuitBet solves this by having players self-fund their very delight in incentives,” acknowledged Dr. Japuntich.
July
Among permanent vascular access options for hemodialysis, arteriovenous grafts carry a higher risk for venous thromboembolism (VTE), including deep vein thrombosis and pulmonary embolism, compared with arteriovenous fistulas. Using information from the 2010-2015 US Renal Data System, investigators compared 17,763 new recipients of arteriovenous grafts and 60,329 recipients of arteriovenous fistulas. Over 3 years, 10.8 vs 5.3 VTE events per 100 person-years occurred in the arteriovenous grafts vs arteriovenous fistulas groups, respectively. After adjustment for potential confounders, arteriovenous grafts were significantly associated with a 74% higher risk for VTE compared with arteriovenous fistulas, Nicholas S. Roetker, PhD, MS, of Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and colleagues reported in Kidney Medicine.
Compared with the use of an arteriovenous fistula, the use of an arteriovenous graft in dialysis is associated with an increased risk of venous thromboembolism, according to data published in Kidney Medicine. “Compared with the general population, patients with kidney failure receiving maintenance hemodialysis face higher risks of both bleeding and thrombosis,” Nicholas S. Roetker, PhD, MS, from the Chronic Kidney Disease Research Group at Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in Minnesota, and colleagues wrote. They added, “Although an arteriovenous (AV) fistula is generally preferred to an AV graft to minimize vascular access complications, given recent guidelines suggesting tailoring the access type to the clinical circumstances of each patient, a better understanding of the risks of bleeding, thrombosis, and other cardiovascular endpoints could help guide the choice of the type of permanent AV access.” Researchers identified 10.8 venous thromboembolism events per 100 person-years among patients using AV grafts, whereas 5.3 venous thromboembolism events per 100 person-years occurred among patients using AV fistulas. Therefore, the use of AV grafts in hemodialysis correlated with an increased risk of venous thromboembolism compared with AV fistulas. Additionally, analyses revealed AV graft use potentially correlated with an increased risk of cardiovascular death.
The Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute is studying the new method of quitting smoking by allowing participants to play a game, called QuitBet. It is quite simple – bet on yourself and win money if you could successfully stay away from cigarettes. The participants can place of bet of $30 on themselves and win the money back, along with a profit if they could manage to refrain from smoking for at least four weeks. The money collected from the participants will be added to a pot and it will be divided among the winners at the end of that period. Most participants who quit smoking will get double the amount they invested. This innovative game was developed by WayBetter. It was part of a series of "serious games" funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) aimed at improving people's health and lifestyle in a fun way. Other such games include DietBet, a weight loss game, and StepBet, which will track your steps. The NIH has provided $1.15 million for the QuitBet research. "We've known for years that paying people to change behaviors, known as contingency management, works to help people stop smoking. However, implementing contingency management in a sustainable way is difficult. QuitBet solves this by having players self-fund their own incentives," said Sandra Japuntich, Ph.D., a Hennepin Healthcare investigator who was part of the study.
The Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute is studying the new method of quitting smoking by allowing participants to play a game, called QuitBet. It is quite simple – bet on yourself and win money if you could successfully stay away from cigarettes. The participants can place of bet of $30 on themselves and win the money back, along with a profit if they could manage to refrain from smoking for at least four weeks. The money collected from the participants will be added to a pot and it will be divided among the winners at the end of that period. Most participants who quit smoking will get double the amount they invested. This innovative game was developed by WayBetter. It was part of a series of "serious games" funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) aimed at improving people's health and lifestyle in a fun way. Other such games include DietBet, a weight loss game, and StepBet, which will track your steps. The NIH has provided $1.15 million for the QuitBet research. "We've known for years that paying people to change behaviors, known as contingency management, works to help people stop smoking. However, implementing contingency management in a sustainable way is difficult. QuitBet solves this by having players self-fund their own incentives," said Sandra Japuntich, Ph.D., a Hennepin Healthcare investigator who was part of the study.
The Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute is evaluating a novel method of quitting smoking by allowing participants to wager on themselves and earn real money. It is a part of a brand-new game called QuitBet, which is supported by a National Institutes of Health (NIH) research grant that is being administered by scientists at Hennepin Healthcare. Players bet $30 on themselves, which is added to the pot, and commit to stopping smoking for four weeks. After that, players get a free breath testing device to monitor their daily progress. All of the players who were able to stop smoking at the end divide the pot with the other winners, winning back their original wager plus a profit. Most winners who give up smoking double their winnings. The principal investigator for the study is Jamie Rosen, founder and CEO of WayBetter. Scientific support is being given by Sandra Japuntich, Ph.D., a Hennepin Healthcare Investigator. The National Institutes of Health provided $1.15 million in funding to help the research. “We’ve known for years that paying people to change behaviors, known as contingency management, works to help people stop smoking. However, implementing contingency management in a sustainable way is difficult. QuitBet solves this by having players self-fund their own incentives,” said Dr. Japuntich.
June
Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute is testing this new innovative way to help people quit smoking by letting them bet on themselves and win real money. The new game is called QuitBet and it is being funded by a National Institutes of Health research grant. Players commit to quit smoking over four weeks and bet $30 on themselves, which goes into the pot. You then get a free breath testing device to track your daily progress. In the end, all the players who managed to quit smoking for the four weeks win their money back plus they split the pot with the other winners. They say winners typically double their money.
Minnesota cigarette smokers who are trying to quit the habit have the opportunity to bet on themselves and earn some cash in the process. The Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, which oversees the medical research at Hennepin County Medical Center, is currently testing the new method to help people during that challenging process, called "QuitBet." It's a game funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) — features participants betting $30 on themselves to quit smoking over a four-week period. “We’ve known for years that paying people to change behaviors, known as contingency management, works to help people stop smoking. However, implementing contingency management in a sustainable way is difficult. QuitBet solves this by having players self-fund their own incentives,” said Dr. Sandra Japuntich, who is a Hennepin Healthcare investigator providing scientific support on the project.
May
Minnesota cigarette smokers who are trying to quit the habit have the opportunity to bet on themselves and earn some cash in the process. The Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, which oversees the medical research at Hennepin County Medical Center, is currently testing the new method to help people during that challenging process, called "QuitBet." It's a game funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) — features participants betting $30 on themselves to quit smoking over a four-week period. “We’ve known for years that paying people to change behaviors, known as contingency management, works to help people stop smoking. However, implementing contingency management in a sustainable way is difficult. QuitBet solves this by having players self-fund their own incentives,” said Dr. Sandra Japuntich, who is a Hennepin Healthcare investigator providing scientific support on the project.
New game helps people to quit smoking. The game lets people bet on themselves and win real money, reveal researchers from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute. It's part of a new game called QuitBet and it's being funded by a National Institutes of Health (NIH) research grant administered by researchers at Hennepin Healthcare. Jamie Rosen, WayBetter's founder and CEO, is the Principal Investigator of the study. Sandra Japuntich, PhD, a Hennepin Healthcare Investigator, is providing scientific support. The study was funded with $1.15 million from the National Institutes of Health. "We've known for years that paying people to change behaviors, known as contingency management, works to help people stop smoking. However, implementing contingency management in a sustainable way is difficult. QuitBet solves this by having players self-fund their own incentives," said Dr. Japuntich.
Michael Culhane had messed up in an EMT practice exercise, and his trainer was letting him know it. There is a cadence and order to the questions that medics ask on emergency scenes, and the 47-year-old firefighter had scrambled them. The criticism was harsh and true, and Culhane was happy to hear it. After nine months in COVID-19 recovery — after receiving overwhelming support to sit up, then stand, then walk again — he wasn't getting sympathy points here. Culhane shared his recovery story this week after returning to HCMC in Minneapolis to thank the caregivers who helped save his life — people he didn't really recognize because he was in a sedated coma during his three-month hospitalization. Culhane was placed on a ventilator at HCMC. His oxygen levels would improve when rolled onto his stomach but plummet when returned to his back. He was recommended for extracorporeal membrane oxygenation, or ECMO, a bypass machine that filters blood when the lungs can't keep pace. The death rate of COVID-19 patients on ECMO is 47%, according to an international registry, but Culhane was running out of options. "He was frankly lucky that his body responded the way it did," said Dr. Matthew Prekker, an HCMC critical care specialist.
The Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute is testing an innovative way to help people quit smoking – by allowing them to bet on themselves and win real money. It is part of a new game called QuitBet and is funded by a National Institutes of Health (NIH) research grant administered by researchers at Hennepin Healthcare. Players commit to quit smoking over four weeks and bet $30 on themselves that goes into the pot. Players will then receive a free breath test device to track their progress each day. In the end, all players who managed to quit will win back their stake and a win as they share the pot with the other winners. Winners usually double their money when they quit smoking. Jamie Rosen, founder and CEO of WayBetter, is the lead investigator on the study. Sandra Japuntich Ph.D., a Hennepin Healthcare Investigator, provides scientific support. The study received $1.15 million in funding from the National Institutes of Health. “We’ve known for years that paying people for behavior changes, known as emergency management, helps them quit smoking. However, it is difficult to implement emergency management in a sustainable manner. QuitBet solves this problem by allowing players to self-fund their own incentives,” said Dr. Japuntich.
Read the story on Fior Reports.
Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute is testing an innovative way to help people quit smoking – by letting them bet on themselves and win real money. It's part of a new game called QuitBet and it's being funded by a National Institutes of Health (NIH) research grant administered by researchers at Hennepin Healthcare. Players commit to quit smoking over four weeks and bet $30 on themselves, which goes into the pot. Players then receive a free breath testing device to track their progress every day. At the end, all the players who have managed to quit win back their bet plus a profit as they split the pot with the other winners. Winners typically double their money while quitting smoking. Jamie Rosen, WayBetter's founder and CEO, is the Principal Investigator of the study. Sandra Japuntich Ph.D., a Hennepin Healthcare Investigator, is providing scientific support. The study was funded with $1.15 million from the National Institutes of Health. "We've known for years that paying people to change behaviors, known as contingency management, works to help people stop smoking. However, implementing contingency management in a sustainable way is difficult. QuitBet solves this by having players self-fund their own incentives," said Dr. Japuntich.
Read the story on Best Health Article.
Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute is testing an innovative way to help people quit smoking – by letting them bet on themselves and win real money. It’s part of a new game called QuitBet and it’s being funded by a National Institutes of Health (NIH) research grant administered by researchers at Hennepin Healthcare. Players commit to quit smoking over four weeks and bet $30 on themselves, which goes into the pot. Players then receive a free breath testing device to track their progress every day. At the end, all the players who have managed to quit win back their bet plus a profit as they split the pot with the other winners. Winners typically double their money while quitting smoking. Jamie Rosen, WayBetter’s founder and CEO, is the Principal Investigator of the study. Sandra Japuntich Ph.D., a Hennepin Healthcare Investigator, is providing scientific support. The study was funded with $1.15 million from the National Institutes of Health.
Read the story on ScienMag Science Magazine.
Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute is testing an innovative way to help people quit smoking – by letting them bet on themselves and win real money. It's part of a new game called QuitBet and it's being funded by a National Institutes of Health (NIH) research grant administered by researchers at Hennepin Healthcare. Jamie Rosen, WayBetter's founder and CEO, is the Principal Investigator of the study. Sandra Japuntich Ph.D., a Hennepin Healthcare Investigator, is providing scientific support. The study was funded with $1.15 million from the National Institutes of Health.
Read the story on News Medical Life Sciences.
The Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients (SRTR) held a consensus conference in 2012 that examined methods used by SRTR for constructing performance metrics and made recommendations on how to improve program-specific reports. During the subsequent decade, SRTR has implemented most of these recommendations; these are described in this article along with plans for another consensus conference in 2022.
Read the article on Physician's Weekly.
HHRI Researcher, Sandra Japuntich, PhD, LP, was on WCCO 830-AM radio. Dr. Japuntich was interviewed about her woman-led cancer research where she talked about the American Cancer Society’s ResearcHERS initiative to get more women involved in cancer research.
Listen to the interview on WCCO News Talk 830. Dr. Japuntich’s interview starts at about 20:45.
Healthcare insurance in the U.S. can be spotty, even with expansion of coverage under the Affordable Care Act. One of the remaining problem areas is coverage for people who are leaving prison or jail. In nonfederal cases, state and county governments pay for healthcare during the period people are incarcerated. But once they are released, there is often a gap before they get signed up for coverage by Medicaid or another payer. For people with chronic health conditions, that gap can lead to medical conditions getting out of control and acute episodes that lead to hospitalization or premature death. The federal Medicaid Reentry Act of 2021 is designed to remedy the situation. Currently, Medicaid programs are explicitly prohibited from covering incarcerated individuals. The proposed law would permit Medicaid to cover people starting 30 days before they are to be released. Advocates and public health officials say that would mean a smoother transition and increase the chances that recently incarcerated people will receive the medical services they need. But the Reentry Act could have some unintended consequences. Utsha Khatri, M.D., of the Institute for Heath Equity Research at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York and Tyler N.A. Winkelman, M.D., M.Sc., of the Health, Homelessness, and Criminal Justice Lab at the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in Minneapolis outlined a few of the consequences in an opinion piece published in April in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Read the story on Managed Healthcare Executive.
Label-concordant dosing may benefit patients on dialysis with nonvalvular atrial fibrillation more than below-label dosing, according to data published in the American Journal of Kidney Diseases. Further, warfarin correlated with an increased risk of bleeding compared with apixaban among this patient population. “Some patients on dialysis who have atrial fibrillation receive apixaban for stroke prevention at a dose below that indicated by the official drug label to reduce adverse bleeding events,” James B. Wetmore, MD, MS, of the chronic disease research group at the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in Minnesota, and colleagues wrote. They added, “Given controversy about apixaban dosing in dialysis, we used data from the United States Renal Data System (USRDS) to examine the effectiveness and safety of apixaban based on whether it was dosed in accordance with its U.S. FDA label (5 mg twice daily) or off-label at a lower dose (2.5 mg twice daily, when 5 mg was actually indicated).”
Read the story and watch the video on Healio.
April
Eric D. Weinhandl, PhD, MS, talks about the hidden costs in helping patients transition from peritoneal dialysis to home hemodialysis. “Increasing use of peritoneal dialysis (PD) will likely lead to increasing numbers of patients transitioning from PD to hemodialysis (HD),” Weinhandl, an epidemiologist at the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in Minneapolis at the time the research was completed, and colleagues wrote in a poster presented at the meeting. Researchers used the U.S. Renal Data System to identify patients aged 12 years and older who were newly diagnosed with end-stage kidney disease from 2001 through 2017.
Read the story and watch the video on Healio.
Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI) announced that Warren McKinney, PhD, has been named HHRI’s VP for Equity in Research. In this role, he also joins the HHRI Board of Directors and the institute’s executive leadership team. Hennepin Healthcare is a UMN CTSA hub partner. Dr. McKinney completed CTSI’s Translational Research and Career Training (TRACT) program as a postdoctoral fellow and then went on to join the Minnesota Learning Health System Mentored Career Development Program, a K12 scholar training program at the University of Minnesota. To Dr. McKinney, CTSI has played a key role in his career. Dr. McKinney will lead the work across the Hennepin Healthcare System to connect efforts to improve health equity, define and drive strategy, and advocate for resources to build equity-focused, community-engaged research.
Read the story on CTSI.
February
Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc, provided KSTP with information from the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) and the partnership with Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI) and the Minnesota EHR Consortium for its story about service agencies using incentives to encourage people experiencing homelessness to get vaccinated. “The latest numbers from MDH and the Minnesota EHR Consortium show 13,246 people statewide have recently utilized a homelessness program. Of that, MDH says 5,749 people have received at least one vaccine shot, and 1,589 have received a booster, as of Feb. 5.”
Watch or read the story on KSTP.
A recently published study offers insight into what is being done differently at practices where patients express high trust in their clinicians and where clinicians trust their organizations. The study, published in Annals of Family Medicine, found there are four cultural variables in trusted organizations. “The emphasis on organizational culture is not an area that gets a lot of attention, but at least from these data, it’s an incredibly powerful variable that organizations should think more about,” said Mark Linzer, MD, lead author of the study, “Where Trust Flourishes: Perceptions of Clinicians Who Trust Their Organizations and Are Trusted by Their Patients.” Dr. Linzer directs the Institute for Professional Worklife and is vice chair of the medicine department at Hennepin Healthcare in Minneapolis.
Read the story on AMA.
January
Tackling the opioid crisis requires changing strategies and the way we think about addiction, says Columbia University professor Sandra Comer. That search led to a new type of treatment — a vaccine that targets the chemical makeup of oxycodone. Comer and her research colleague, Marco Pravetoni, are testing the vaccine on volunteers with substance use disorder. Dr. Pravatoni began work on the opioid vaccine when he was an investigator at the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI). Dr. Pravetoni left HHRI and joined the University of Minnesota in the fall of 2018. He was recently recruited from Minnesota to lead UW Medicine’s new Center for Medication Development for Substance Use Disorders.
Watch or read the story on CBS Evening News.
Dr. James Miner, chief of emergency medicine at Hennepin Healthcare and HHRI investigator, says hospitals are busier than they've ever been.
Watch the story on KARE-11.
2021
December
More than 1 million COVID-19 cases have been diagnosed in Minnesota since the pandemic began in the state nearly 22 months ago. State health officials announced another 4,155 new cases Monday, bringing the total number of infections to 1,000,361. It has taken just 27 days for the state to add 100,000 new cases. The previous 100,000 took 26 days before that, making this one of the fastest-growing surges since late last year. Booster shots could slow the spread, according to a new study using Minnesota health records. The study, believed to be the largest of its kind to evaluate booster effectiveness in the United States, used patient medical records from 11 health systems that are part of the Minnesota Electronic Health Record Consortium, which was formed to conduct large-scale research. Researchers did not have access to private information about the patients. Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc, Anne Murray, MD, MSc, and Peter Bodurtha are authors from HHRI on this study.
Read the articles on Star Tribune and MedRxiv.
Researchers identified four characteristics that were likely to improve a physician’s trust in their organization. “Trust is an intrinsic and critically important aspect of the health care workplace. Health care workers need to believe their workplaces will watch out for them, keep them safe and provide a work environment where they can provide high-quality care for their patients,” Mark Linzer, MD, a physician with Hennepin Healthcare in Minneapolis, told Healio Primary Care. Linzer and colleagues conducted an analysis of the Healthy Work Place Study, which was a randomized trial of workplace interventions designed to improve work conditions in 34 primary care clinics in the Midwestern and Eastern United States.
Read the article on Healio.
November
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on Upper Michigan's Source.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on News Break.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on NBC 12 News.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on KOLD News 13.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on WCJB.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on WCAX.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on WDTV.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on KPLC 7 News.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on KLTV 7.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on NewsChannel 10.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on Web Center Fairbanks.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on NBC Nebraska Scottsbluff.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on FOX 8.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on KWQC.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on WMBF News.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on FOX 19 Now.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on KKCO 11 News.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on Suncoast View.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Read the article on Hawaii News Now.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten the health of communities worldwide, and health care communities seek to administer COVID vaccines en masse, patients' trust in the medical profession has never been more important. Researchers from Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota, found that patients' trust in their clinicians is connected to specific aspects of culture of the organization, and the level of trust their clinicians have in the health organization in which they work. "Lack of trust in the medical profession has implications for patient care since research from past epidemics has shown that lack of trust decreases the likelihood of patients adhering to public health recommendations," Mark Linzer, MD, et al write. "It is critical to identify factors that will assist health systems to better understand how to create the most trust within their work environments."
Home dialysis use has been on the rise, with greater absolute growth occurring with peritoneal dialysis (PD) and greater relative growth observed with home hemodialysis (HHD), according to data presented during the American Society of Nephrology’s Kidney Week 2021. From 2016 to 2021, home dialysis use rose from 11.6% to 14.5%, Eric D. Weinhandl, PhD, MS, of Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and colleagues reported. During that same period, HHD use increased from 1.57% to 2.31% and PD use increased from 10.0% to 12.2%.
Read the article on Renal & Urology News.
October
For many people in their 50s, 60s, and 70s, taking a low-dose aspirin has been part of their daily routine for decades. For people without cardiovascular disease, it has long been accepted that daily low-dose aspirin lowers the odds of having a first heart attack or stroke. The idea is so ingrained among the general public that millions take “baby” aspirin without consulting their physicians. But a proposed update to the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force guidelines will likely pull back the task force's 2016 recommendations and limit daily aspirin for prevention to a more restricted group. The biggest change in 2021 is that the latest science casts doubt about aspirin’s ability to prevent colon cancer. A lot of people are unaware of this aspect of the guidelines, but the 2016 Task Force considered aspirin’s effect on colon cancer to get a more complete picture of aspirin’s potential benefits. But the ASPREE trial, which enrolled people 70 years old or older, found during the five-year trial that colon cancer risk was higher with aspirin than without it. That said, the jury is still out regarding colon cancer—any benefits of aspirin in clinical trial participants will likely take 10 or 20 more years to come to light. This means that in the future, these guidelines may change again. HHRI researcher Anne Murray, MD, MSc, is Co-PI on the ASPREE trial.
For many people in their 50s, 60s, and 70s, taking a low-dose aspirin has been part of their daily routine for decades. For people without cardiovascular disease, it has long been accepted that daily low-dose aspirin lowers the odds of having a first heart attack or stroke. The idea is so ingrained among the general public that millions take “baby” aspirin without consulting their physicians. But a proposed update to the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force guidelines will likely pull back the task force's 2016 recommendations and limit daily aspirin for prevention to a more restricted group. The biggest change in 2021 is that the latest science casts doubt about aspirin’s ability to prevent colon cancer. A lot of people are unaware of this aspect of the guidelines, but the 2016 Task Force considered aspirin’s effect on colon cancer to get a more complete picture of aspirin’s potential benefits. But the ASPREE trial, which enrolled people 70 years old or older, found during the five-year trial that colon cancer risk was higher with aspirin than without it. That said, the jury is still out regarding colon cancer—any benefits of aspirin in clinical trial participants will likely take 10 or 20 more years to come to light. This means that in the future, these guidelines may change again. HHRI researcher Anne Murray, MD, MSc, is Co-PI on the ASPREE trial.
Read the story on Columbia University Irving Medical Center.
In Minnesota, people of color experience some of the worst health disparities in the U.S. The Center for Chronic Disease Reduction and Equity Promotion Across Minnesota, or C2DREAM, is a new research center led by Mayo Clinic and the University of Minnesota that aims to reduce these disparities in collaboration with Minnesota community leaders and community health organizations. "The C2DREAM research center will evaluate novel interventions designed to address structural and interpersonal racism as a fundamental cause of cardiovascular health disparities among people of color in rural and urban communities in Minnesota," says Christi Patten, Ph.D., a Mayo Clinic behavioral health researcher and co-principal investigator for C2DREAM. C2DREAM is a regional effort spanning Minnesota that includes Mayo Clinic, Southeast; Mayo Clinic Health System, South and Southwest; the University of Minnesota, Hennepin Healthcare, and Native American Community Clinic, Central and North; and the Rand Corp. It brings together researchers and community stakeholders from various disciplines, drawing on evidence-based medical expertise and local and cultural knowledge.
Read the article on Post Bulletin.
Rochester, Minn.-based Mayo Clinic and the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis have received a five-year, $19.4 million grant from the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities to create a research center aimed at reducing heart health disparities. The Center for Chronic Disease Reduction and Equity Promotion Across Minnesota will work with community partners to support clinical research on community and primary care approaches to diet, physical activity, smoking cessation and other factors related to heart health disparities. Additionally, the program will explore the root causes of health inequities, according to an Oct. 19 news release.
Read the article on Becker's Hospital Review.
The University of Minnesota and Mayo Clinic have received a $19.4 million federal grant to start a new research center that will focus on racial disparities in cardiovascular health. The five-year grant from the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities will be used to support clinical research on community and primary care approaches to diet, physical activity, smoking cessation and other factors that impact heart health. Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute is among the organizations that will collaborate with the new research initiative.
Read the article on Star Tribune.
The University of Minnesota and Mayo Clinic have received a $19.4 million federal grant to start a new research center that will focus on racial disparities in cardiovascular health. The five-year grant from the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities will be used to support clinical research on community and primary care approaches to diet, physical activity, smoking cessation and other factors that impact heart health. Hennepin Healthcare and the Native American Community Clinic in south Minneapolis are among the organizations that will collaborate with the new research initiative.
Read the article on Yahoo Entertainment.
Research has shown the effectiveness of aspirin in the secondary prevention of cardiovascular disease among persons with a history of coronary heart disease. The evidence of primary prevention is less conclusive, despite some studies showing that aspirin reduces the incidence of cardiovascular events and possibly reduces the incidence of cancer and cancer-associated mortality. In this study, scientists conducted the Aspirin in Reducing Events in the Elderly (ASPREE) randomized, placebo-controlled trial across 34 sites in the United States and 16 sites in Australia. Trial subjects were community-dwelling men and women from Australia and the United States. A total of 19,114 persons were enrolled in the study, of whom 9,525 were randomly assigned to receive aspirin. The participants were 70 years of age or older (≥65 years of age for blacks and Hispanics in the U.S.) and were free of any chronic illness. White participants comprised 91% of the study cohort. Additionally, 56.4% of the participants were women and 11.0% reported previous regular aspirin use. HHRI researcher Anne Murray, MD, MSc, is Co-PI on the ASPREE trial.
Read the article on News Medical Life Science.
September
The number of patients starting treatment for end-stage kidney disease (ESKD) in the US dropped sharply during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, with the most pronounced decline occurring among individuals aged 75 years or older, according to a new study. “The abrupt decline in documented ESKD incidence is unprecedented: the approximately 2200 persons per week known to reach ESKD during the initial height of the pandemic has not been observed since 2011,” James B. Wetmore, MD, MS, of the Chronic Disease Research Group, Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, Minneapolis, Minnesota, and colleagues reported in the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology. During the initial height of the pandemic (epidemiologic weeks 15-18; April 2020), the documented incidence of ESKD decreased by 25% overall and 31% among those aged 75 years or older compared with corresponding periods in 2017-2019.
Read the article on Renal & Urology News.
zAmya Theater brings people with (and without) experience around homelessness together around theater, community, advocacy and social justice. For this production, zAmya worked with Dr. Kate Diaz Vickery Diabetes + Homelessness Research Team from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute. They did a staged reading of the play at the Capri Theatre in North Minneapolis. Dr. Vickery has been working on research and prevention of diabetes, especially with people experiencing homelessness for many years. Her team went to a zAmya production before the pandemic and a lightbulb popped. She realized that theatre might be an effective way to get the message to the target market. The show was much more engaging and memorable than a brochure.
Read the article on Mostly Minnesota.
August
Imagine you’ve been on a waiting list for a new liver for years. When you learned you would need an organ transplant, your head was spinning. You were sent to a transplant center, where you underwent a lengthy evaluation process to determine your eligibility to be placed on the waiting list for a new liver. Three and a half years later, your phone rings in the middle of the night. It’s your transplant center, calling to offer you a liver! Finally, the moment you’ve been waiting for. But wait — the nurse coordinator on the other end of the line is explaining that the organ you’re being offered came from someone who died of a drug overdose, although test results don’t show any signs of infection. “The current process for matching an organ to a patient isn’t very patient-friendly,” says Cory Schaffhausen, PhD, a researcher at Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, assistant professor at University of Minnesota Medical School, and human-centered design engineer at the Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients (SRTR), a data registry located at Hennepin Healthcare that analyzes outcomes for organ transplant donors and recipients across the U.S. He set out to change that in 2020 with his research and design project, Embedding Human-Centered Design and Learning Health System Research in the Transplantation System.
Read the story on UMN.
Things have looked up for U.S. kidney transplant recipients over the past few decades, according to a review article. In adult kidney transplant recipients, the total number of transplants from living and deceased donors in the U.S. jumped from 45,008 in 1996-1999 up to 76,885 in 2016-2019, reported Sundaram Hariharan, MD, of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, and colleagues. This uptick was largely driven by a rise in the number of transplants from deceased kidney donors, from 29,823 in 1996 to 53,139 in 2019, they stated in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Read the article on MedPage Today.
An ongoing COVID-19 clinical trial studying the outpatient use of metformin, a generic medication for type 2 diabetes, has expanded and will now be the nation’s first to include fluvoxamine, an antidepressant, and ivermectin, an antiparasitic, as possible treatment options to prevent hospitalization and “long COVID.” Hennepin Healthcare in Minneapolis is a participating Clinical trial site.
Read the article on The Gilmer Mirror.
The University Hospital Center for Advanced Liver Diseases and Transplantation program was rated the top program for the second consecutive evaluation period for one-year survival rates in the Tri-state area by the Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients. The program led by Rutgers New Jersey Medical School physicians has an estimated one-year survival rate of nearly 99 percent. Since 1989, the center for Advanced Liver Diseases and Transplantation has completed more than 1,500 liver transplant surgeries. In the past two years, the center performed over 80 transplants. The Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients is a federally supported program for organ transplantation in the country. It is operated by the Chronic Disease Research Group and is a division of the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute.
Read the article on Tap into Newark.
For the second consecutive evaluation period, the Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients (SRTR) has rated the liver transplant program at Newark’s University Hospital Center for Advanced Liver Diseases and Transplantation, as the regional leader in one-year survival rates. The Center is led by the nationally-recognized physicians at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School. With an estimated one-year survival rate of 98.75%, the Center was rated as one of the top centers from all hospitals in the New York Tri-State area of New Jersey, New York and Connecticut. The SRTR, operated by the Chronic Disease Research Group, a division of the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, is a federally supported program. Evaluations of liver transplant programs are released twice a year, in January and July.
Read the article on New Jersey Business.
July
The number of patients receiving treatment for end-stage kidney disease in April was 0.6% lower than a year ago, the first such year-to-year drop in patient census since 1980, a new study shows. “Between week 1 of 2015 and week 13 of 2020, the numbers of dialysis and transplant patients steadily increased, with little deviation from quadratic trends,” Eric D. Weinhandl, PhD, MS, and colleagues from the Chronic Disease Research Group at the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in Minneapolis, wrote.
Read the article on Healio.
Black patients and patients with limited English language proficiency were more likely to get a COVID-19 test initiated in an in-person healthcare setting than via telehealth, according to data published in JAMA Network Open that emphasizes how social determinants of health affected COVID-19 testing access during the pandemic. The report, completed by researchers from the University of Minnesota and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI), particularly investigated health disparities in some of the emerging care access modalities made prominent by the COVID-19 crisis. This isn’t because getting an ED-based test is better or worse care; rather, the disparity likely stems from the already poor health experienced by the individual admitted for inpatient care. This demonstrates how barriers to various care access modalities can affect downstream health outcomes, according to Peter Bodurtha, a data scientist with HHRI who worked on the study.
The opioid epidemic led to a record number of drug overdoses in the United States last year. The spike is happening in Minnesota, too. Just under 800 Minnesotans died from drug overdoses in 2019. More than 1,000 died last year — a 35% jump. When a lot of the world was shutting down due to the pandemic, the counselors at the Alliance Wellness Clinic in Bloomington stayed open to help people struggling with opioid addiction. Yussuf Shafie owns the clinic. Dr. Gavin Bart, an addiction medicine specialist at Hennepin Healthcare and HHRI researcher, says deadly overdoses from illicitly manufactured opiates like fentanyl are way up in Minnesota.
Read the story on CBS Minnesota.
A recent study from researchers at the University of Minnesota and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI) is among the first to examine how different socio-demographic groups used telehealth, outpatient (i.e., clinic), emergency department and inpatient (i.e., hospital) care to test for SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. Their findings were recently published in JAMA Network Open. The study was led by U of M School of Public Health along with others from Hennepin Healthcare and HHRI. Researchers included Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc, and HHRI Data Scientist Peter Bodurtha. The team analyzed anonymous electronic health record data for people with symptoms of viral illness who received SARS-CoV-2 testing at Hennepin Healthcare, a large safety-net health system in Minneapolis. The researchers also added that the inequities could be partially explained by clinician and clinic variations in telehealth use. “Without structural reforms, rapid implementation of telehealth and other new services may exacerbate inequities in access to care, particularly if these investments come at the expense of other care sites,” said Bodurtha.
Read the article on UMN.
April
A Penn Medicine study found that Medicaid expansion helped increase access to medication for opioid use disorder, despite some existing limitations to widespread access. The study, led by Perelman School of Medicine fellow Utsha Khatri, found that Medicaid expansion correlates to significant improvements in accessing medication for OUD. Previous clinical studies have found that medications for opioid use disorder result in more effective outcomes for retention in treatment, reduced illicit opioid use, decreased opioid-related overdose rates, and serious acute care. “Medicaid alone will not entirely close gaps in care between people with and without criminal justice involvement. Additional work is needed to understand key drivers of the persistent disparities we identified,” senior author Tyler Winkelman, Co-Director of the Health, Homelessness, and Criminal Justice lab at the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, told Penn Medicine News.
Read the article on The Daily Pennsylvanian.
March
A record number of Hennepin County residents fatally overdosed from opioids or methamphetamines last year, with an alarming spike in deaths from fentanyl, a powerful synthetic painkiller that can be lethal even in tiny doses. Hennepin County recorded 285 opioid-related deaths for the year, with nearly all involving at least trace amounts of fentanyl. That is up from 170 opioid deaths the year before. Methamphetamine overdoses reached a record 116 in the county last year. Methamphetamine use surged during the pandemic because the drug is more accessible and cheaper to buy, said Dr. Tyler Winkelman, a physician who treats inmates with substance abuse issues at the Hennepin County jail. With opioid and methamphetamine abuse worsening in Hennepin County, COVID-19 has scared people away from seeking treatment, he said.
Read the article on Star Tribune.
2020
August
The immune system overreaction to COVID-19 has become a key target for therapeutic research, including a new trial at the University of Minnesota using stem cells to try to suppress the body’s response to infection and repair the damage it causes. A COVID-19 Treatment Guidelines team formed by the National Institutes of Health has reviewed evidence for using mesenchymal stem cells to treat this hyperimmune response but does not recommend them outside of clinical trials. “It’s very much not ready for clinical implementation and clinical use,” said Dr. Jason Baker, a Hennepin Health doctor who is part of the NIH review team. “There is potential, but it very much needs to be proven.”
Read the story on Star Tribune.
Preliminary research by Mayo Clinic shows that high-dose plasma therapy is correlated with fewer deaths in patients with severe COVID-19. A 10 percentage point difference in deaths was found when comparing hospitalized COVID-19 patients who received donor plasma with high concentrations of virus-fighting antibodies compared with those who received lower concentrations, Mayo reported. HCMC in Minneapolis and Regions routinely screen COVID-19 patients shortly after admission for their interest and eligibility for convalescent plasma. “We’re all kind of waiting for more standard products to come out where you know how much antibody that someone is getting,” said Dr. Anne Frosch, who is leading HCMC’s COVID-19 convalescent plasma program.
Read the story on Star Tribune.
Published in the peer-reviewed journal Health Affairs, “Practice and Policy Reset Post-COVID-19: Reversion, Transition or Transformation?” was written by Christine Sinsky, MD, vice president of professional satisfaction at the AMA, and AMA member Mark Linzer, MD, director of the Institute for Professional Work Life at Hennepin Healthcare and professor of medicine at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. The commentary examines actions by regulators and payers to modify policies and lift administrative and technological burdens that allow health professionals to meaningfully care for patients with COVID-19. Most ambulatory visits are now being conducted through telehealth and in places where COVID-19 is surging, there is a need for all hands-on deck. This has led health professionals to take on new roles to meet the demand. To support these changes, the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and other regulators and payers have modified longstanding policies, eliminated some nonessential administrative tasks and reduced preexisting constraints on team-based care.
Read the story on AMA.
July
When Jennifer Bennetch noticed boarded-up houses seemingly everywhere in North Philadelphia, she began documenting them. She noted their addresses and followed up to see the status of the properties: whether new residents had moved in, or if the houses were being renovated or brought to auction. She ultimately found that the owner of the properties, the Philadelphia Housing Authority (PHA), had no plans but to let them sit idle—so, in March, she quietly began moving in families. Moms 4 Housing has framed their fight for housing as a human right; their claim to secure and affordable housing is shaped through their identity as mothers with children in their care. Their demand for a home in which they can securely dwell and raise their family is a core component of reproductive justice, defined by SisterSong as the “right to maintain personal bodily autonomy, have children, not have children, and parent them in safe and sustainable communities.” Housing functions as an “anchor that families require to build security in terms of shelter, food, education, childcare, and employment,” Dr. Diana Cutts, a pediatrician and co-lead principal investigator for the research group Children’s HealthWatch, told Rewire.News.
Read the story on Rewire News.
April
Medical experts have for weeks tested the degree to which anti-viral treatments such as hydroxychloroquine and remdesivir can prevent the coronavirus from gaining ground inside a patient’s body. With a boost from Bill Gates, two doctors at the University of Minnesota Medical School are challenging the medical community to try a different approach — treatment studies involving common high-blood pressure medications. “This is different than doing what most of the other clinical trials are trying to do right now,” said Dr. Michael Puskarich, associate professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine at the University and emergency physician at Hennepin Healthcare. “We’re looking at more of the downstream consequences of the virus.” The doctors have launched two multi-site inpatient and outpatient clinical trials involving the drug Losartan.
Read the story on Pioneer Press.
Hennepin Healthcare has launched two clinical trials for a drug to see if it will help COVID-19 patients. The trials are being doing through the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute. “The clinical trials will help to determine if remdesivir is a safe and effective drug that can improve outcomes for patients diagnosed with COVID-19 here at Hennepin Healthcare and in the broader community,” principal investigator Dr. Jason Baker said.
Read the story on CBS Minnesota.
A new drug is being called a ‘ray of hope’ in treating COVID-19. "This is a medicine that directly attacks the virus," said Jason Baker, MD, MS, Hennepin Healthcare’s infectious disease director. Doctors at the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute hope to enroll about 1,000 patients now hospitalized with moderate or severe COVID-19.
Read the story on MinnPost.
Initially, remesivir was developed to treat ebola but failed to stop that virus. But now it has been found that the drug affects other forms of coronavirus, including SARS and MERS. “It turned out to be very active against that virus in the lab, so it quickly escalated to human studies for the COVID outbreak,” said HHRI’s Principal Investigator Jason Baker, MD, MS. The drug, which has not been approved by the Food and Drug Administration, is administered through an IV and works by preventing the virus from growing.
Read the Vaaju story.
Remdesivir was originally developed to treat Ebola, but was unable to stop this virus. However, the drug has been found to affect other forms of the coronavirus, including SARS and MERS. “It was found to be very active in the laboratory against this virus, and it was therefore quickly expanded to human studies for the COVID outbreak,” said HHRI’s Principal Investigator Jason Baker, MD, MS. Hennepin Healthcare wants to determine if the drug is useful and safe.
A new drug is being called a "ray of hope" in treating COVID-19. “This is a medicine that directly attacks the virus,” said Jason Baker, MD, MS, Hennepin Healthcare’s infectious disease director. “Rendesivir is one of the only direct anti-viral medicines that’s being studied in the context of COVID-19.” Doctors at the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute hope to enroll about 1,000 patients now hospitalized with moderate or severe COVID-19.
Researchers at Hennepin Healthcare are joining sites across the world in studying a drug that could help patients who have COVID-19. The clinical trials now underway at Hennepin Healthcare will study hospitalized patients with severe and moderate cases of COVID-19. They'll get an IV of remdesivir, an experimental antiviral drug. It was created to treat Ebola, but wasn't effective for that disease. "It actually blocks the virus' ability to reproduce itself genetically. It blocks that replication," said Dr. Jason Baker, the Director of Infectious Disease at Hennepin Healthcare.
Read the story on KARE 11.
Hennepin Healthcare has announced it has launched two clinical trials to study the safety of using an antiviral drug created for Ebola patients on those with the coronavirus. The Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI), the medical research organization based at Hennepin County Medical Center, says it will be trialing the drug Remdesivir on patients with moderate or severe COVID-19. "We are proud to be a site that’s conducting research on this investigational treatment,” said HHRI’s Principal Investigator Jason Baker, MD, MS.
A drug that is showing some early success in treating severe cases of COVID-19 is now being studied in trials by Hennepin Healthcare. The Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute has launched two trials to study the safety of remdesivir. The drug had previously been tested on humans for an Ebola treatment. It has also shown some success with in vitro and animal models against other coronaviruses strains including MERS and SARS.
Read the story on FOX 9.
Hennepin Healthcare and Mayo Clinic are participating in an international clinical trial on using the drug remdesivir to treat hospitalized COVID-19 patients. Hennepin Healthcare in Minneapolis said Friday it will have 70 patients in part of a 1,000-patient worldwide study of the potential antiviral treatment developed by Gilead Sciences in California. Mayo Clinic in Rochester is also among the 133 study locations. Remdesivir showed "antiviral activity" against other coronaviruses MERS and SARS. Gilead and Hennepin Healthcare will look at the safety and efficacy on moderate to severe cases COVID-19 in a FDA clinical study. It started on March 6 and has a primary completion date of May. Hennepin Healthcare expects results on the severe group in early May. "We are proud to be a site that's conducting research on this ... treatment," Jason Baker, MD, MS, Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute's primary investigator, said in a statement. "The clinical trials will help to determine if remdesivir is a safe and effective drug that can improve outcomes for patients diagnosed with COVID-19 here at Hennepin Healthcare and in the broader community."
Read the story on Pioneer Press.
Hennepin Healthcare and Mayo Clinic are participating in an international clinical trial on using the drug remdesivir to treat hospitalized COVID-19 patients. Gilead and Hennepin Healthcare will look at the safety and efficacy on moderate to severe cases COVID-19 in a FDA clinical study. "The clinical trials will help to determine if remdesivir is a safe and effective drug that can improve outcomes for patients diagnosed with COVID-19 here at Hennepin Healthcare and in the broader community," said Jason Baker, MD, MS, Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute’s primary investigator.
Read the story on Pioneer Press.
Kelley Baer’s schedule at the Shakopee women's correctional facility doesn’t change. Due to precautions made due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Baer’s days are stretching even longer. The gym is closed, inmates can only spend one hour outside each day, and the women are limited to 1.5 hours in the day room. “If there are strong measures in place already, like minimizing groups, isolating older or more sick patients in different parts of the prison, screening staff… it could be that the scope of coronavirus in facilities could be relatively small,” said Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc, the co-director of the Health, Homelessness, and Criminal Justice Lab at Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute and a doctor at Hennepin County Jail. According to a notice sent to all DOC staff members, anyone who walks into a correctional facility must first be screened. That screening involves asking each staff member if they are showing symptoms such as a cough, and taking temperatures.
Read the story on Southwest News Media.
March
Upon hearing that a surge of COVID-19 cases could consume all hospital ventilators, Dr. Stephen Richardson rummaged for parts in the medical device lab at the University of Minnesota and built a homemade version. In a first test last week, the prototype kept a pig breathing for an hour and raised the prospect that low-budget ventilators could be built to solve a shortage. The makeshift ventilator was made from $150 in parts, with a motor ripped from another device and a red metal toolbox tray as its base. The university also is one arm of a multisite national trial of remdesivir, an experimental drug that failed in prior studies to treat infections from the Ebola and Marburg viruses. A third U-generated trial, awaiting FDA approval, would test whether a blood pressure-lowering medication, losartan, minimizes the damage of COVID-19. When infection stops ACE-2 receptors from working, there is a buildup of a hormone called angiotensin II that causes lungs to constrict and fluid to build up, explained Dr. Michael Puskarich, emergency physician at Hennepin Healthcare, who will be leading an arm of this trial at Hennepin Healthcare in downtown Minneapolis.
Read the article on Star Tribune.
Physicians and other health professionals are desperately needed during the global response to the COVID-19 pandemic. These individuals also represent one of the most at-risk populations for acquiring COVID-19. However, they face another risk: added stress. During these trying times, it is important to keep well-being in mind and address stress. “The impact of COVID-19 is overwhelming,” said AMA member Mark Linzer, MD, director of the Institute for Professional Work Life at Hennepin Healthcare and professor of medicine at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. “Everybody's wrestling with what's happening and what we can best do to take care of it.”
Read the AMA story.
The next site of a deadly coronavirus outbreak may not be a cruise ship, conference, or school. It could be one of America’s thousands of jails or prisons. Just about all the concerns about coronavirus’s spread in packed social settings apply as much, if not more, to correctional settings. In a prison, multiple people can be placed in one cell. Hallways and gathering places are often small and tight (often deliberately so, to make it easier to control inmates). There is literally no escape, with little to no space for social distancing or similar recommendations experts make to combat coronavirus. Hand sanitizer can be contraband. “We can learn what works in terms of mitigation from other countries who have seen spikes in coronavirus already, but none of those countries have the level of incarceration that we have in the United States,” Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc, a doctor and researcher at Hennepin Healthcare and the University of Minnesota focused on health care and criminal justice, told me.
Read the story on Vox.
This week, a person incarcerated in King County Jail in downtown Seattle was taken to the hospital after they were suspected of having the new coronavirus. The county says there are no cases currently in the jail, but the new virus remains a huge concern for correctional facilities, particularly in outbreak hotspots like King County. With 85 confirmed cases of COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus, the county is home to the largest known hotspot of cases of the new coronavirus in the United States. It’s only a matter of time before the novel coronavirus enters a US jail or prisons, says Tyler Winkelman, MD, MSc, co-director of the Health, Homelessness, and Criminal Justice Lab at the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in Minneapolis. “All prisons and jails should anticipate that the coronavirus will enter their facility, and they need to have plans for monitoring and treating anyone who has symptoms,” he says.
Read the story on The Verge.
2019
October
Dr. Hilden brings in special guest Dr. Anne Murray to talk the serious and important topic of dementia.
Listen to the Healthy Matters podcast.
September
Abbott announced that a high-sensitivity troponin I blood test used to detect MI has received FDA clearance. The blood test (Architect Stat) can detect very low levels of troponin, which allows physicians to assess patients within 2 to 4 hours of admission, according to a press release from the company. Results of the test are not affected by biotin interference, which is important as biotin supplements grow in popularity, according to the release. “The addition of Abbott’s high-sensitivity troponin I assay to the laboratory’s diagnostic testing menu is a great step forward to help laboratory scientists and clinicians better evaluate patients suspected of having a heart attack,” Fred. S. Apple, PhD, DABCC, co-director of the Clinical and Forensic Toxicology Laboratory at Hennepin Healthcare/Hennepin County Medical Center in Minneapolis and professor of laboratory medicine and pathology at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, said in the release.
Read the Healio story.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) cleared Abbott’s blood test to help aid in the diagnosis of heart attacks for men and women hours earlier than standard tests and marks significant progress for detecting heart attacks in women. Fred Apple, co-director of Clinical and Forensic Toxicology Laboratory at Hennepin Healthcare/Hennepin County Medical Center, said the addition of Abbott's high sensitivity troponin-I assay to the laboratory's diagnostic testing menu is a “great step forward to help laboratory scientists and clinicians better evaluate patients suspected of having a heart attack.”
Read the story on BioSpace.
Abbott announced today that new research, published in the journal Circulation, found its algorithm could help doctors in hospital emergency rooms more accurately determine if someone is having a heart attack or not, so that they can receive faster treatments or be safely discharged."With machine learning technology, you can go from a one-size-fits-all approach for diagnosing heart attacks to an individualized and more precise risk assessment that looks at how all the variables interact at that moment in time," said Fred Apple, Ph.D., Hennepin HealthCare/ Hennepin County Medical Center, professor of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology at the University of Minnesota, and one of the study authors. "This could give doctors in the ER more personalized, timely and accurate information to determine if their patient is having a heart attack or not."
August
Opioid addiction preventive vaccine would contain fentanyl hapten removing positive reaction to the drug. The University of Montana has received a $3.3 million contract from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to develop an innovative vaccine targeting opioid addiction. The principal investigator on the 2-year award is Dr. Jay Evans, director of the University of Montana (UM)’s Center for Translational Medicine and a research professor in the Division of Biological Sciences. Other investigators on the award are Drs. David Burkhart, Kendal Ryter and Helene Bazin-Lee from UM in Missoula, Marco Pravetoni from the University of Minnesota, and Paul Pentel and Mark LeSage from Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute.
Read the Precision Vaccinations story.
July
Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute investigator Dr. Fred Apple, PhD, DABCC, discusses his article "Myocardial Infarction Risk Stratification With a Single Measurement of High-Sensitivity Troponin I" recently published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.
Read the interview on MedicalResearch.com
Gov. Tim Walz signed into law a response to Minnesota’s opioid crisis that he says holds Big Pharma accountable. In 2017, there were more than 2,000 visits to Minnesota emergency rooms for opioid-involved overdoses, with 422 Minnesotans losing their lives. Since 2010, the rate of opioid-related overdose deaths has steadily increased each year. The new law, championed in the Minnesota House by Rep. Liz Olson (DFL – Duluth), becomes effective immediately. The bill includes funding for Hennepin Healthcare’s “Project ECHO,” grants for tribal nations and urban Native-American communities, and additional staff for the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension’s drug labs and trafficking enforcement efforts. It also includes reforms to drug prescribing practices, improves efforts to safely remove excess drug supplies, and increases supplies of Naloxone (Narcan) for first responders.
Read the story on Insight News.
June
A new program is underway in Hennepin County to help inmates struggling with addiction. They are now screened for opioid use disorder when they arrive at the Adult Detention Center. It started in January to connect inmates with medication assisted treatment. “The folks that we’re seeing have been struggling with their substance use disorder for at least a year, but often 10, 15 or 20 years,” said Dr. Tyler Winkelman.
At Hennepin Healthcare, doctors read plenty of studies, but one that claims taking certain pills may increase your risk of dementia by as much as 50%, certainly stands out. Dr. Anne Murray works in geriatrics and conducts research of her own. She says the medical community has long suspected anticholinergic drugs, which are used to treat things like depression, Parkinson’s, incontinence, allergies and other conditions, may cause dementia later in life.
Mark Linzer, MD, Principal Investigator of the Healthy Work Place study, was interviewed on JNO Live about the study that shows trust is an important attribute to clinician satisfaction; identifies characteristics associated with gender, organizational climate. The live JAMA Network Open broadcast aired on Twitter, YouTube and Facebook.
May
The World Health Organization this week recognized burnout as an official medical diagnosis. "I think it's a really important thing that they've done this. I think that provides a foothold to begin the conversation about the workplace. What we can do to help," said Dr. Mark Linzer at Hennepin Healthcare. "Raises an important question. Now that we have a diagnosis, what can we do?"
March
Drug seizures for Minnesota's Violent Crime Enforcement Teams increased in several major drug categories in 2018. The increase in drug seizures corresponds with studies that have found a rise in drug use among Minnesotans and nationally. Dr. Tyler Winkelman of Hennepin Healthcare says research has shown that hospitalizations related to methamphetamine increased 270 percent nationally between 2008 and 2015.
Seizures of methamphetamine in Minnesota surged at an alarming level last year, as have confiscations of other illicit drugs, state public safety officials said, and a major bust already this year suggests the influx is not letting up. Dr. Tyler Winkelman, a physician and researcher at Hennepin Healthcare, said the “unintended consequences of getting rid of local meth labs with the crackdown on Sudafed” — the over-the-counter product that provides a key ingredient for making meth — is “that opened up the meth cartels from Mexico.”
People paralyzed from a serious injury are being given an opportunity many thought they'd lost for good. Researchers at the University of Minnesota and Hennepin Healthcare are helping them regain voluntary movement and so much more.
What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: Kidney transplantation confers profound survival, quality of life, and cost benefits over dialysis for the treatment of end-stage kidney disease. Kidney transplant recipients under 65 years of age qualify for Medicare coverage following transplantation, but coverage ends after three years for patients who are not disabled.
Read the full interview with Allyson Hart MD MS, Department of Medicine, Hennepin Healthcare, University of Minnesota on MedicalResearch.com
Drug seizures for Minnesota’s Violent Crime Enforcement Teams (VCET) increased in several major drug categories in 2018, according to the Minnesota Department of Public Safety. The increase in drug seizures corresponds with studies that have found a rise in drug use among Minnesotans and nationally. According to research conducted by Dr. Tyler Winkelman of Hennepin Healthcare, hospitalizations related to methamphetamine increased nationally by 270 percent from 2008-2015, faster that any other form of substance abuse. The number of women using methamphetamine during pregnancy has increased significantly since 2008, particularly in rural areas.
February
Researchers from the University of Minnesota and Hennepin County hope to use a recent study regarding opioid-related deaths after incarceration to address the opioid epidemic. About one-third of opioid-related deaths in Hennepin County occurred within one year of inmates leaving jail, according to a report released by the county last month. Now, public health care officials and University researchers hope to offer care to incarcerated individuals with opioid use disorder based on the report’s recommendations. "Our workgroup made recommendations to begin treating people with opioid use disorders in county correctional facilities," said Tyler Winkelman, an author of the report, clinician-investigator with Hennepin Healthcare and assistant professor of medicine at the University. The treatment would include providing medications to incarcerated individuals with opioid use disorder and connecting them to community providers upon release.
New research by a local team of doctors is proving to be life-changing for people paralyzed by spinal cord injuries. It’s giving hope to thousands who previously thought they would never walk again. It took the University of Minnesota and Hennepin Healthcare two years to get through all of the paperwork, including grant approvals. It’s especially unique because doctors are studying patients who have been paralyzed for multiple years.
There are more than 290,000 people estimated to be living in the United States with a spinal cord injury. Previously, it has been shown that it is possible to restore some function to young and healthy patients within a few years of injury. Now, researchers show spinal cord stimulation can immediately restore some voluntary movement and autonomic functions such as cardiovascular, bowel, and bladder years after a paralyzing injury without any significant rehabilitation. "This was an opportunity to use epidural stimulation, combine my background in mathematics, collaborate with people from multiple disciplines including biomedical engineering and set up a truly innovative trial," said Dr. David Darrow, a neurosurgery resident at the University of Minnesota Medical School and a lead investigator for the E-STAND Clinical trial. He is also a senior neurosurgery resident at Hennepin Healthcare and University of Minnesota Medical Center.
January
There are more than 290,000 people estimated to be living in the United States with a spinal cord injury. Previously, it has been shown that it is possible to restore some function to young and healthy patients within a few years of injury. Now, researchers show spinal cord stimulation can immediately restore some voluntary movement and autonomic functions such as cardiovascular, bowel, and bladder years after a paralyzing injury without any significant rehabilitation. "This was an opportunity to use epidural stimulation, combine my background in mathematics, collaborate with people from multiple disciplines including biomedical engineering and set up a truly innovative trial," said Dr. David Darrow, a neurosurgery resident at the University of Minnesota Medical School and a lead investigator for the E-STAND Clinical trial. He is also a senior neurosurgery resident at Hennepin Healthcare and University of Minnesota Medical Center. "We wanted to push the envelope for patients. Once we determined it worked, we moved on to knocking down other barriers to translation to patient care."
Seasonal flu and other respiratory infections may be especially dangerous for kidney failure patients, researchers say. A new study found that influenza-like illnesses likely contribute to more than 1,000 deaths among kidney failure patients in the United States each year. These illnesses include potentially serious respiratory tract infections caused by flu and other viruses. For the study, David Gilbertson, co-director of the Chronic Disease Research Group at Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in Minneapolis, and his colleagues reviewed 14 years of federal data.
Read the story in U.S. News & World Report
Community activity for influenza-like illness (ILI) is associated with seasonal variation in all-cause mortality among patients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD), according to a study published online January 24 in the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology. David T. Gilbertson, PhD, from the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute in Minneapolis, and colleagues calculated quarterly relative mortality compared with average third-quarter (summer) death counts after addressing overall increasing trends in death due to the growing prevalent ESRD population. Linear regression models were used to assess the correlation between ILI data and mortality.
In patients with kidney failure, influenza-like illness (ILI) likely contributes to more than 1,000 deaths per year. The finding, which comes from a study appearing in an upcoming issue of the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology (JASN), points to the importance of protection against, surveillance of, and, where possible, treatment of such infections in patients with kidney dysfunction.
The extent to which ILI contributes to mortality in patients with ESRD is unclear. To investigate, David Gilbertson, Ph.D. (Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute and the University of Minnesota) and his colleagues analyzed data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Outpatient ILI Surveillance Network and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services ESRD database from 2000-2013.
Flu-like illness contributed substantially to mortality for people with end-stage renal disease (ESRD), an analysis spanning 14 years of U.S. data indicated. During influenza season -- the 6 months from October to March -- excess deaths averaged more than 1,000 annually among the at-risk ESRD population, according to David Gilbertson, PhD, of the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute and the University of Minnesota, and colleagues, pointing to influenza-like illness (ILI) as the likely reason.
2018
November
Kristen Philman had already been using heroin and prescription painkillers for several years when, one day in 2014, a relative offered her some methamphetamine, a chemical cousin to the stimulant amphetamine. "I didn't have any heroin at the time," says Philman, a resident of Littleton, Colo. "I thought, 'Oh this might make me feel better.' "It did, she says. Soon, she was using both heroin and methamphetamine on a regular basis.
Committed to making physician burnout a thing of the past, the AMA has studied, and is currently addressing, issues causing and fueling physician burnout—including time constraints, technology and regulations—to better understand the challenges physicians face.
Mark Linzer, MD, director of the division of general internal medicine at Hennepin County Medical Center in Minneapolis, has long studied physician burnout.
“Burnout doesn’t have to be highly expensive to fix,” said Dr. Linzer, director of the HCMC Center for Patient and Provider Experience. “Preventing burnout can actually save money in the long run on recruiting and training new practice staff.”
The number of people hospitalized because of amphetamine use is skyrocketing in the United States, but the resurgence of the drug has largely been overshadowed by the nation’s intense focus on opioids.
Amphetamine-related hospitalizations jumped by about 245 percent from 2008 to 2015, according to a study published last month in the Journal of the American Medical Association. That dwarfs the rise in hospitalizations from other drugs, such as opioids, which were up by about 46 percent. The most significant increases were in Western states.
The JAMA study, based on hospital discharge data, found that the cost of amphetamine-related hospitalizations had jumped from $436 million in 2003 to nearly $2.2 billion by 2015. Medicaid was the primary payer.
For those with a substance use disorder, the risk of death from an overdose in the two weeks after leaving prison is 10 times higher than in the general population, said Dr. Tyler Winkelman of the Minneapolis-based Hennepin Healthcare, who researches health
issues in the criminal justice system.
Because there has been so much attention on opioids, “we have not been properly keeping tabs on other substance use trends as robustly as we should,” said study author Dr. Tyler Winkelman, a physician at Hennepin Healthcare in Minneapolis.
The number of people hospitalized because of amphetamine use is skyrocketing in the United States, but the resurgence of the drug largely has been overshadowed by the nation’s intense focus on opioids.
The number of people hospitalized because of amphetamine use is skyrocketing in the United States, but the resurgence of the drug largely has been overshadowed by the nation’s intense focus on opioids. Amphetamine-related hospitalizations jumped by about 245% from 2008 to 2015, according to a recent study in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
11 a.m. – MPR News at 11
An estimated 30,000 people died from opioid overdoses in the U.S. in 2017. With so many people being affected what is being done to treat addiction?
Guests: Marco Pravetoni, associate professor, Department of Pharmacology, senior investigator at the Minneapolis Medical Research Foundation in the Hennepin County Medical Center; Joseph Lee, M.D., medical director, Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation Youth Continuum.
Dr. Diana Cutts, a pediatrician from Hennepin Healthcare, part of the FoodRx program, said the dilemmas poor families face are real and wrenching.
October
“One of the problems with addiction treatment is that it’s generally been put on the patient to take care of on their own. We wouldn’t tell someone with cancer or heart disease to go make an appointment and hope they get better,” said Dr. James Miner, chief of emergency medicine at HCMC. “The goal now is to get people started on treatment and on the road to recovery right away.”
Aspirin YES or NO? Dr. Anne Murray, a geriatrician and the US Principal Investigator for the ASPREE study is Dr. David Hilden's guest on Healthy Matters on WCCO Radio, October 21, 2018.
September
Aspirin has been a top topic all week — in clinics, living rooms and offices — because
three studies challenged the guidance for certain older adults taking it daily.
The latest study, known as ASPREE, followed 15,000 healthy adults ages 70 and older
over five years. It found that those taking aspirin had no greater protection from
disabilities or heart attacks but did have higher drug-related risks of internal bleeding.
Margolis and Bloomington-based HealthPartners enrolled 250 adults. Minneapolis-based
Hennepin Healthcare led the U.S. arm of the study, which was based in Australia.
Dr. Anne Murray, the Hennepin geriatrician who led the research, has been flooded with
questions about her results: “It’s been a combination of patients and colleagues, some of
whom are taking aspirin themselves.”
Many older people who’ve survived a heart attack or stroke take low-dose aspirin every day to help prevent further cardiovascular problems [1]. There is compelling evidence that this works. But should perfectly healthy older folks follow suit?
Most of us would have guessed “yes”—but the answer appears to be “no” when you consider the latest scientific evidence. Recently, a large, international study of older people without a history of cardiovascular disease found that those who took a low-dose aspirin daily over more than 4 years weren’t any healthier than those who didn’t. What’s more, there were some unexpected indications that low-dose aspirin might even boost the risk of death.
The long-awaited results of the Aspirin in Reducing Events in the Elderly (ASPREE) trial, partly funded by NIH, were presented in three papers just published in the New England Journal of Medicine [2,3,4]. It’s the largest primary prevention study ever undertaken in healthy older people.
To take a closer look, a research team led by John McNeil, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia, and Anne Murray, Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, Minneapolis, launched the ASPREE trial in 2010.
A major international study led in part by a Minnesota physician has found that healthy
people over age 70 got no preventive benefit from aspirin and were at greater risk for
harm such as stomach bleeding. It's the third major study this year to reach a similar
conclusion.
"We hope this shifts the paradigm for people 70 and older who are considering taking
aspirin," said Dr. Anne Murray, a geriatrician at Hennepin Healthcare in Minneapolis
who led the research along with Dr. John McNeil in Australia.
Many heart-healthy older people take a daily baby aspirin out of a belief that it will help prevent a
heart attack or stroke. A major new study, published online Sunday in three articles in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM), now calls that common practice into serious question. It found that for older people with no history of heart attack, stroke or congestive heart failure taking a daily aspirin might do more harm than good.
”We found there was no discernible benefit of aspirin on prolonging independent, healthy life for the elderly,” Dr. Anne Murray, one of the authors of the study and an epidemiologist and geriatrician at Hennepin Healthcare in Minneapolis, told National Public Radio (NPR) reporter Rob Stein.
Read the MinnPost story
In healthy elderly people who never had a heart attack, the widespread practice of taking a baby aspirin every day may do more harm than good, according to a U.S.-Australian study of more than 19,000 volunteers.
The results - which show that risks of major bleeding in low-dose aspirin users overwhelm any heart benefits - were reported online in the New England Journal of Medicine and presented Sunday at the European Respiratory Society International Congress in Paris.
Read the Reuters story on FOX NEWS
It's one of the most well-known tenets of modern medicine: An aspirin a day keeps the doctor away. But according to a trio of studies published Sunday in the New England Journal of Medicine, a daily low-dose aspirin regimen provides no significant health benefits for healthy older adults. Instead, it may cause them serious harm.
Should older people in good health start taking aspirin to prevent heart attacks, strokes,
dementia and cancer?
No, according to a study of more than 19,000 people, including whites 70 and older, and
blacks and Hispanics 65 and older. They took low-dose aspirin — 100 milligrams — or a
placebo every day for a median of 4.7 years. Aspirin did not help them — and may have
done harm.
Read the story in The New York Times
The possible utility of aspirin for primary prevention has taken another blow with new results showing no benefit of treatment in extending disability-free survival, a novel endpoint that combines all-cause death, dementia, or physical disability, among healthy elderly persons.
A second report showed no significant reduction in cardiovascular disease but a significantly higher risk for major hemorrhage, and a third analysis showed higher all-cause mortality with aspirin therapy, mostly attributed to increased cancer risk, although the researchers urge caution in interpreting this latter finding.
The results, from the Aspirin in Reducing Events in the Elderly (ASPREE) trial, were published online September 16 in three separate papers in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM).
Daily aspirin not only failed to help generally healthy older individuals reduce their risk of disability-free survival and cardiovascular disease in the placebo-controlled ASPREE trial, it also appeared to raise overall mortality and particularly death from cancer.
Many healthy Americans take a baby aspirin every day to reduce their risk of having a heart attack, getting cancer and even possibly dementia. But is it really a good idea?
Results released Sunday from a major study of low-dose aspirin contain a disappointing answer for older, otherwise healthy people.
"We found there was no discernible benefit of aspirin on prolonging independent, healthy life for the elderly," says Anne Murray, a geriatrician and epidemiologist at Hennepin Healthcare in Minneapolis, who helped lead the study.
A regimen of low-dose aspirin “offers healthy, older people no benefit in staving off cardiovascular disease, dementia or disability and increases their risk of bleeding in the digestive tract and brain, according to a large study released Sunday.” The article says that research indicates “a regimen of low-dose aspirin offers healthy, older people no benefit in staving off cardiovascular disease, dementia or disability and increases their risk of bleeding in the digestive tract and brain.” The findings were published in three articles in the New England Journal of Medicine. In a news release, Richard J. Hodes, Director of the National Institute on Aging, said, “Clinical guidelines note the benefits of aspirin for preventing heart attacks and strokes in persons with vascular conditions such as coronary artery disease.” Hodes added, “The concern has been uncertainty about whether aspirin is beneficial for otherwise healthy older people without those conditions.”
Researchers determined that after nearly five years in treatment, participants’ “rate of heart disease was not significantly lower,” although the “rate of major bleeding with daily aspirin use was 3.8 percent, versus 2.8 percent with placebo.” Lead author Dr. John J. McNeil of Monash University commented, “Essentially, we could not identify any subgroup in whom aspirin was beneficial in preserving good health.”
For decades, a daily dose of aspirin has been widely considered a way to protect healthy people from cardiovascular disease and even cancer. But a large international study finds that even at low doses, long-term use of aspirin may be harmful — without providing any benefit — for older people who have not already had a heart attack or stroke.
The new research reinforces the results of a study published in late August, which found that daily low-dose aspirin was too risky to be prescribed to patients at moderate risk of heart disease. In the August study and the new one, researchers found a significant risk of internal gastric bleeding caused by the medication, which thins the blood. Older patients experienced no health benefits from taking aspirin, according to the new report, published Sunday in the New England Journal of Medicine.
“We knew there would an increased risk of bleeding with aspirin, because there has always been," said study coauthor Dr. Anne Murray, a geriatrician and epidemiologist at the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute and the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis. "But not only did it not decrease risk of disability or death, it did not decrease the risk of heart attack and stroke, and there was an increase in the rate of death."
There's disappointing news for seniors: A new trial shows that taking daily low-dose aspirin doesn't prolong healthy, independent living in otherwise healthy people aged 70 and older.
Aspirin has long been recommended for middle-aged folks with a history of heart disease, to prevent future heart attacks or strokes.
Researchers had hoped that aspirin's specific effects might help folks ease gracefully into their old age.
"The thinking was the double action of blood thinning and anti-inflammation might decrease the risk of dementia and disability," explained senior researcher Dr. Anne Murray, director of the Berman Center for Outcomes and Clinical Research at Hennepin Healthcare in Minneapolis.
But a major new clinical trial has concluded that daily aspirin does not prolong disability-free survival in the elderly.
Another clinical trial has added more evidence against the fairly common practice of prescribing aspirin to healthy older adults in order to prevent the onset of cardiovascular disease.
The clinical trial, which ran from 2010 to 2014 and included 19,114 individuals 70 years and older from the U.S. and Australia, found that a low daily dose of aspirin only marginally decreased a patient's risk of cardiovascular disease while significantly increasing the patient's risk of hemorrhage. Additionally, higher death rates were reported among those taking aspirin daily although the researchers are skeptical about how much weight to put on the finding since it's an unexpected outcome compared to similar studies.
"For a healthy person 70 and older who doesn't have an indication to be on aspirin, there really is no benefit to be on aspirin, in fact, the risks appear to outweigh the benefits in terms of increase bleeding risk and the potential for increased mortality risk," said Dr. Anne Murphy, co-principal investigator of the trial and director of the Berman Center for Outcomes and Clinical Research.
Millions of healthy people who take aspirin to ward off illness in old age are unlikely to
benefit from the drug, a trial has found.
While a daily dose of the blood-thinning medicine can protect older people who have
previously experienced heart attacks, strokes and angina, researchers found the drug did
not extend the lifespan of healthy people over the age of 70.
Doctors in Australia and the US enrolled more than 19,000 healthy people, mostly aged
over 70, for the trial. Half the participants were asked to take 100mg of aspirin each day,
while the rest took a placebo pill.
July
People addicted to prescription opioids or heroin are far more likely to have run-ins with the
law than those who don't use opioids, according to a new study published Friday in JAMA
Network Open.
"There have been reports that jails and prisons are bearing the brunt of the opioid epidemic,
but we didn't know nationally how many people who use opioids are involved in the criminal
justice system," says Tyler Winkelman, a clinician-investigator at Hennepin Healthcare in Minneapolis, and lead author of the study.
May
Providing integrated medical care and social support services led to increased use of
primary care among vulnerable adults who were enrolled in a Medicaid accountable
care organization (ACO), according to two studies published in Medical Care Research
and Review.
One study used Medicaid claims data for about 90,000 enrollees to compare the use of
medical services by Hennepin Health (Hennepin County, MN) ACO enrollees to non-ACO
Medicaid enrollees in the same geographic area.
The second study used interview data from 35 Hennepin Health members enrolled for two or more years during the study period.
People take a vaccine for the flu every year to avoid getting sick, but researchers across the country are working on a vaccine to help opioid addicts avoid overdosing.
"Ultimately, I think it can save lives. A vaccine like this could offer sort of long lasting protection," said senior investigator at the Minneapolis Medical Research Foundation (MMRF) Dr. Marco Pravetoni. Pravetoni and his team at MMRF have been working on a vaccine for the last 10 years, with their primary focus on the prescription painkiller oxycontin.