October 26, 2022 

Concerns Increasing About New Omicron Variants of SARS-CoV-2

It is not yet clear if pharmacists will be busy for the next few months administering bivalent COVID-19 booster vaccines. If they are not, the risk of a difficult winter with high rates of SARS-CoV-2 infections greatly increases. Find out how much of the concern is being sparked by aggressive new Omicron variants.

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Medicare Prescription Drug Spending Continues to Increase

The share of Medicare spending attributable to prescription drugs continues to rise, according to a new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. That percentage jumped from 24% in 2008 to more than 27% in 2019. Find out why the authors suggested those findings are likely to affect public policy in the future.

Apixaban Linked to Lower Stroke, Bleeding Risk

Rivaroxaban and apixaban are both oral direct factor Xa inhibitors and are used as alternatives to vitamin K antagonists. But that does not mean the two drugs work exactly the same, according to a new study that found lower risk for ischemic stroke, systemic embolism, and bleeding with apixaban when compared with rivaroxaban in atrial fibrillation/valvular heart disease patients. Read more.

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Race a Factor in Use of Menopause Hormone Therapy

Pharmacists and other healthcare providers should provide more counsel about treatment alternatives to women with menopause symptoms. That is according to a new report that studied who received hormone therapy and how well they did on it. While white women are more likely to use hormone therapy and reported a quality-of-life improvement, that was not the case for other ethnic/racial groups. Read more.

 
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