< Back to front page Text size – +

Today's Globe: Lahey accusations, insurer rankings, hospital restrictions, online drug ads, Neurontin studies

E-mail | Print | Comments () Posted by Elizabeth Cooney November 12, 2009 07:02 AM

Facebook
E-mail

A cardiologist at Lahey Clinic said he was fired for resisting pressure from two top physicians at the hospital to use stents made by device giant Medtronic Inc., even though the company’s stents might not have been best for some patients.

A half-dozen New England health insurers weighed in among the top 10 commercial health plans nationally in a ranking set to be released today by U.S. News and World Report magazine and the National Committee for Quality Assurance, a nonprofit organization in Washington, D.C.

Several hospitals north of Boston are modifying their visitation rules in response to the spread of H1N1 and seasonal flu in Massachusetts.

As federal regulators take their first tentative steps toward policing the wild west of medical information online, pharmaceutical companies are pressing their case to market drugs via Google, Twitter, and other websites.

Analysis of a dozen published studies testing possible new uses for the Pfizer Inc. epilepsy drug Neurontin found that reporting of the results was often fudged, indicating the medicine worked better than internal company documents showed.

Facebook
E-mail

« Back to front page

About white coat notes

White Coat Notes covers the latest from the health care industry, hospitals, doctors offices, labs, insurers, and the corridors of government. Chelsea Conaboy previously covered health care for The Philadelphia Inquirer. Write her at cconaboy@boston.com. Follow her on Twitter: @cconaboy.

Daily Dose | More Health&Wellness

health answers

Long-term health consequences to being born prematurely? It's estimated that each year nearly 500,000 babies in the United States are born prematurely, or before 37 weeks of pregnancy. Submit question | More answers