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FZ Weekly Lab Med News Digest

Lab is Taking Over:

“Health Care Without the Doctor: How New Devices and Technologies Aid Clinicians and Consumers,” claims advancements in diagnostic, monitoring, and treatment technologies will allow a shift away from physicians toward mid-level clinicians and consumers. Based on the study, a new report released by California HealthCare Foundation, predicts that these innovations will increase the healthcare system’s capacity and reduce costs while also improving access and quality of care.  (1) The point-of-care testing market is expected to grow to $18.7 billion by 2011. (2) More than 62,000 health-related websites exist, attracting an average of 55.3 million visitors per month—approximately 31% of the total U.S. Internet audience.  (3) The most commonly visited website is Webmed.com.

Personalized Medicine: Sequence your whole genome under $50K.

Illumina has partnered with a number of direct-to-consumer genomics firms to deliver the first personalized, whole genome sequencing analysis for under $50,000. The service will offer sequencing of an individual’s DNA and information on SNP variations and other characteristics of the genome. Illumina’s partners will provide secondary analysis such as disease risk, ancestry, and information on other traits of interest. “Rapidly decreasing costs have made sequencing a pervasive technology that can begin to be accessed at the consumer level,” said Jay Flatley, CEO and president of Illumina. “We are entering a new era of genomic health, where information from an individual’s genome will begin to inform lifestyle decisions and ultimately assist in health management. We believe that in the long-run personal genome sequencing will become a routine practice and the information generated will enable physicians to make better healthcare decisions for the consumer.”

Some numbers:

Cancer or oncology service accounted for 93.2 billions in direct medical cost in 2008.  Total estimated cancer cases in 2009 for men: 766,130 and for women 713,220. Cancers kill about 562,340 patients in 2009.

Alzheimer’s disease affects 5.3 million people in USA with about 500,000 new cases each year. The incidence is expected to 1 million per year. In 2008, about 10 million AD caregivers in US provided 8.5 billion hours of unpaid care valued at 94 billion dollars.The average cost for an AD patient in a private nursing home is $76,000 per year.  Based on the current rate, the state and federal programs will spend about 118 billions of dollars in 2050 for AD care.

There are about 400,000 multiple sclerosis (MS) patients (and about 2.5 millions worldwide). The typical MS patient’s biologics cost is between $25K to 30K per year. The cost is cincreasing at annual rate of 16%.

Total projected cancer incidence will increase by an estimated 45% between 2010 and 2030, with a 67% increase projected in adults ? age 65, versus an 11% increase among younger adults. This compares with a projected overall population increase of 19%. The incidence of cancer in minorities over the same period is expected to rise by 99% compared to only a 31% increase in Caucasians. The percentage of cancers diagnosed in older Americans will rise to 70% from 61%, and in minorities, to 28% from 21%.

The most recent data from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) reveal that surgical pathology continues to be the highest-volume Part B pathology procedure, with approximately 20.5 million procedures and $1.2 billion in Medicare payments in 2007, according to the forthcoming Washington G-2 Reports’ 2008 Medicare Reimbursement Manual for Laboratory & Pathology Services, to be published this summer.

© 2009 hematopathologist.com. (RSS)