Friday, May 18, 2007

Today's Globe: Boston lupus, brain injury suit, office search, preemies and diabetes, generic drugs, free lunch

Residents of Roxbury and Mattapan are more likely than people in any other Boston neighborhood to suffer from the painful auto-immune disease lupus, according to a state health report released last night at a community forum.

Brain-injury patients filed a class- action lawsuit yesterday against the state and the Patrick administration alleging that the Commonwealth has failed to provide community-based care. As a result, the plaintiffs say, thousands of severely handicapped residents face a lifetime of nursing home confinement in violation of federal law.

Federal and state law enforcement officials armed with a search warrant searched the office of a Needham doctor yesterday, but gave few details why. The US Drug Enforcement Administration, along with seven other agencies, executed a search warrant at the Gould Street office of Dr. Joseph Zolot, said DEA spokesman Anthony Pettigrew.

Premature infants are more likely to develop high blood pressure and show signs of insulin resistance as young adults, a comprehensive study from Finland shows.

Growing use of generic drugs instead of the more expensive brand name medications they mimic kept the growth rate in US spending for prescription drugs to 2.8 percent in 2006, according to a report released yesterday.

Patients are the clear winners when doctors and pharmaceutical experts communicate, Scott Lassman, is the senior assistant general counsel for the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, writes in an opinion piece. Any effort to quell discussion or limit the sharing of research and information is not in patients' best interests.

Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 06:22 AM

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