Media Coverage

HHS recently announced the creation of the Quality Summit, which will bring together federal and private healthcare stakeholders to evaluate and streamline federal value-based care programs.[CR-LF][CR-LF]The summit is in response to the Trump Administration’s recent executive order calling for greater healthcare price and quality transparency. Physicians in a 2018 report from Quest Diagnostics also called for less complex quality measurement.

Quest Diagnostics (NYSE: DGX), the world’s leading provider of diagnostic information services, today launched a new Lyme Disease test offering that individuals can purchase through Quest’s consumer-initiated testing service, QuestDirect.[CR-LF][CR-LF]The blood test screens for immunoglobulin M (IgM) and immunoglobulin G (IgG) antibodies produced by the body to fight infection to the bacterium that causes Lyme disease. Through this service, individuals who suspect they have been bitten by a tick carrying Lyme disease can purchase laboratory tests to aid in the identification of Lyme Disease. Individuals 18 years of age or older may access the test service at any of Quest’s 2,250 patient service centers across the United States without first needing to consult a physician. The service is available in 45 states starting today.

In a fascinating LinkedIn post titled, “Who’s Responsible For Healthcare's Biggest Problems? 'Not Me.',” ​former Permanente Medical Group Chief Executive Officer and Exxecutive Director Robert Pearl, MD, observes that there is a lot of finger pointing at the “culprits” to blame for America’s failures to improve clinical outcomes and contain spending. [CR-LF]A recent Quest Diagnostics study presented at the recent ADA 79th Scientific Sessions found that individuals at risk of developing type 2 diabetes who take part in an employer-sponsored wellness program with digital interventions can reduce their risk of developing the chronic disease for up to 8 years. Sixty-two percent of participants lost weight after the DPP, with 31% losing 5% or more of body weight, and levels for all biometric markers in the risk model—including for glycated hemoglobin, high-density lipoproteins (HDL, or "good" cholesterol), fasting glucose, and triglycerides—improved across all study cohorts.

United Health Group announced its plans to invest around $8 million over the next five years to launch a data science initiative with the Atlanta University Center Consortium, a group of historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), per Forbes. But VBC implementation has been a big headache for providers — and it's slowing adoption.Nearly 80% of US providers say the shift to value-based care reimbursement models hasn't been successful, according to a 2018 Medical Group Management Association survey of 426 individuals from group health practices. Because VBC relies on accurate data collection and reporting to calculate payment, the clerical burden on doctors has significantly increased. And close to 60% of payers think physicians lack the proper tools to find success under a VBC model, according to a 2018 Quest Diagnostics survey. This friction with providers is putting a major drag on VBC adoption: We reported last week that only 25% of healthcare organizations' revenue comes from VBC, per estimates from a 2018 Optum-sponsored survey.

Since the dawn of time, there have been women who get pregnant without a second thought—and in some cases without even trying—and there have been women who have had to endure years of struggling to conceive. Somewhere in between are the women who talk about kids “someday” with no indication of whether or not someday will ever actually come. Beyond that there are women who just don’t know what the future holds for them and for a lot of us, this is a source of existential anxiety.Modern Fertility is a hormone test you can order to your home or take to your local Quest Diagnostics so that you have a clearer picture of your reproductive future.

When employers invest in a digital diabetes prevention program (DPP), they want to see measurable clinical results and high levels of engagement. Quest Diagnostics recently demonstrated both in a partnership with Omada Health, with 62% of the participants losing weight and the average employee completing more than 25 lessons over 9 months.1 The findings were presented at the American Diabetes Association (ADA) 79th Scientific Sessions.

At a time when clinicians are already increasingly switching to interferon-gamma release-based assays (IGRAs) for tuberculosis testing, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently warned of an anticipated shortage of a key antibody for tuberculin skin tests (TSTs) conducted in clinics. [CR-LF]Hema Kapoor, medical director of infectious diseases and immunology at Quest Diagnostics, said in an interview that while the response to the current announcement will depend on how clinicians react to it, over the years she has seen continuing growth for IGRA testing, supported by guidelines that have recommended blood-based TB testing over skin testing for certain populations.

On the 25th June, Q2 released details of its completed Proof of Concept for tracking biological samples using distributed ledger technology (DLT). The project, with enterprise blockchain firm R3 and medical tech company HSBlox, involved a simulation of the entire process; collecting, transporting, testing, and storing the sample.[CR-LF][CR-LF]Q2, a joint venture of IQVIA and Quest Diagnostics to provide services to clinical trial labs, conducted the effort. Atlanta based HSBlox developed the patent-pending Digital Sample Manager for the project, which runs on R3’s Corda blockchain and Microsoft’s Azure.

On Jan. 1, Illinois became the 11th state to allow recreational marijuana sales. But despite its increasing availability in the U.S., laws to protect cannabis-using job seekers are still uncommon.[CR-LF][CR-LF]That’s changing in Nevada, which legalized recreational use of pot in 2017, and now bans employers from denying jobs to applicants who test positive for marijuana on a pre-employment drug test — excluding jobs with safety issues, like fire fighters or other emergency responders.[CR-LF][CR-LF]Such protections aren’t available in California, where recreational use has been legal since 2016 and medical use has been legal for more than two decades. That’s made finding work difficult for 20-year old Layla Larson, who said she uses cannabis daily to manage her epilepsy and anxiety.