Innovative Approaches in Patient-Centered Care

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Innovative Approaches in Patient-Centered Care

President Jimmy Carter, television personality Alex Trebek and Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg have something in common: All are successfully dealing with their cancer with the help of innovative treatment approaches.

But arriving at new life-saving treatments doesn’t just happen. It requires interest and investment, decades of research, and a paradigm shift in the way physicians think about cancer treatment. Above all, it requires a patient-centered approach to care.

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Protecting Patient Access to Treatments for Neurodegenerative Diseases

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Protecting Patient Access to Treatments for Neurodegenerative Diseases

Millions of Americans and their families deal with the debilitating effects of neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and Huntington’s.

For years, failed attempts to find treatments that would slow, stop, or cure these illnesses have discouraged researchers and patients. Although there are no cures for these progressive conditions, there are now treatments that can improve symptoms and quality of life, and there are promising new therapies in development.

Yet as patients and physicians look forward to these breakthrough treatments, a new concern looms: Will health plans and coverage policies allow patients to access long-awaited treatments for neurodegenerative diseases?

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Improving Access to Cardiovascular Care

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Improving Access to Cardiovascular Care

The scope of cardiovascular disease’s cost, both financial and in human suffering, should not be underestimated. Heart disease costs the United States an estimated $30.7 billion per year. And the situation is only going to grow worse: The American Heart Association projects that 40.5 percent of the U.S. population will have some form of CVD by the year 2030.

The good news is that cardiovascular disease sits at the apex of priorities for the U.S. healthcare system. As a result, patients and physicians have access to a range of effective and time-tested treatments, such as statins, beta blockers and ACE inhibitors, as well as life-changing devices, such as pacemakers. Over the past few years, treatment options have expanded further to include significant new therapies that can help more patients gain better control over their symptoms, experience fewer side effects, and live longer lives with conditions like heart failure, high cholesterol and high blood pressure.

But obstacles threaten patients’ access to both new options and old, dissuading or outright preventing them from obtaining the best therapy or device. That’s because healthcare concerns are trumped by decisions based on short-term benefits. But by carefully advocating long-term solutions backed by experts—the physicians and providers on the front lines treating cardiovascular disease—we can radically improve the heart health of our nation.

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National Survey of Attitudes Toward Cardiovascular Treatment & Access

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National Survey of Attitudes Toward Cardiovascular Treatment & Access

An attitudinal survey of more than 350 heart disease patients, providers, caregivers and stakeholders revealed widespread concerns about how health plans delay access to life-saving medication. The issue affects a broad swath of the country. One-third of Americans have high LDL cholesterol, putting them at increased risk for heart disease, the leading cause of death in the United States. Meanwhile, one American has a heart attack every 40 seconds. For these people, unreasonable medication delays caused by prior authorization or step therapy can be serious, even life threatening.

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Protecting Access to Diabetes Care

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Protecting Access to Diabetes Care

Almost 1 in 10 Americans – men, women, and children of all ethnicities and income levels – has diabetes. One of the most common medical conditions in America, diabetes has become more widespread in recent years, increasing by more 1 million people between 2012 and 2015 alone.

Not surprisingly, diabetes is an expensive disease. In 2017 diabetes cost the United States $237 billion in direct medical costs and $90 billion in reduced productivity, accounting for about one in every four health care dollars spent. People with diabetes incurred an average per-patient cost of $16,750 a year.

Diabetes’ impact and prevalence demand policies that allow people to access appropriate medications and effective health care.

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Movement Disorders: Impact and Access to Treatment

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Movement Disorders: Impact and Access to Treatment

Movement disorders are neurological conditions that cause involuntary or abnormal voluntary body movements, or slow, reduced movements. They afflict millions of people—patients themselves, and also families, caregivers, communities, the health care system, and the economy.

Many conditions fall under the umbrella of movement disorders, including Parkinson’s disease, tardive dyskinesia, Huntington’s disease, dystonia, essential tremor, Tourette syndrome, ataxia, restless legs syndrome, and others. Causes of various movement disorders range from nerve diseases (the cause of Parkinson’s) to injuries, autoimmune diseases, infections, and certain medications. Some are genetic disorders, passed on from one generation to the next.

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Biologics: Can Patients Get What the Doctor Orders?

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Biologics: Can Patients Get What the Doctor Orders?

What if you had a chronic disease causing increasing disability whose progression could be slowed by a medication that you could not afford? Or, what if your physician prescribed a certain medication that your insurance company elected not to cover? What if your insurance company refused to pay for the medication until you suffered symptoms and your condition worsened? Unfortunately, these situations are all too common when patients try to obtain a class of therapies known as biologics.

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