This Week in Managed Care: December 19, 2015

Hello, I’m Justin Gallagher, associate publisher of The American Journal of Managed Care. Welcome to This Week in Managed Care, from the Managed Markets News Network.

Shkreli Arrested on Fraud

This week, Martin Shkreli, the young CEO of Turing Pharmaceuticals made famous when he raised the price of Daraprim from $13.50 to $750 a pill overnight, was arrested for fraud.

According to a report in The New York Times, the arrest is tied to Shkreli’s earlier stint as a hedge fund manager, not to his time in the pharma sector. Read updates on ajmc.com as this story develops.

Health Spending

Drug costs continue to take up a larger share of healthcare spending, both from a national perspective and for individual patients, according to research released this week by the Kaiser Family Foundation.

One reason prescription drug costs feel so expensive at the household level is that increased cost-sharing has coincided with expensive new drugs hitting the market, according to the report.

The year 2014 brought several new expensive specialty drugs, after an extended period in which health plans benefited from the end of patent protection for several popular drugs. Drug costs took up 11.4% of all healthcare spending in 2014 and 9.6% in 2015, the report said.

The Shortcomings of the 340B Program

In the current issue of Evidence-Based Oncology, 3 leading healthcare experts offer a blueprint for reforming the 340B prescription drug program, which has come under fire this year for growing beyond its original purpose of helping safety-net hospitals serve the poor. Critics say too many hospitals are using 340B as a profit center and driving up drug prices overall, at the expense of Medicare and community oncology practices.

One of the authors of the article, Dr Michael Kolodziej of Aetna, recently told AJMC how the Health Resources Services Administration, also known as HERSA, should take the lead in reforming 340B. Watch the video.

Read the full commentary.

Patient-Centered Diabetes Care 2016

Finally, registration is now open for Patient-Centered Diabetes Care, our multi-stakeholder meeting that brings together providers, payers, and other leaders to share ideas in managing this chronic condition. We’ll be gathering this year outside New York City in Teaneck, New Jersey with new sessions on obesity and managing diabetes through telehealth. Register now.

For everyone at the Managed Markets News Network, I’m Justin Gallagher. Thanks for joining us.