Costs Higher With Managed Care

Although managed care can reduce the state's cost of caring for individuals with severe mental illness who are receiving Medicaid, it may actually increase the burden for the patients, according to a new study that was led by researchers at the Louis de la Parte Florida Mental Health Institute at the University of South Florida. The study compared costs in two Medicaid managed care plans with a standard fee-for-service Medicaid plan. Medicaid saved money with the managed care plans, but the patients in the fee-for-service plan had “significantly lower costs” than those who were in managed care. Managed care costs were higher because patients relied more on family caregiving, according to the authors. “For adults with severe mental illness, it appears that efforts to contain Medicaid mental health costs may result in deflecting costs back to these vulnerable persons and onto their families and friends,” the authors concluded. The study was published on-line in the American Journal of Psychiatry on Jan. 15.

Drug Prevention Grants Available

The White House Office on National Drug Control and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) are making $19 million available to fund Drug-Free Communities Support Programs. The program was created in 1997 and given a 5-year reauthorization in 2006. The grants are aimed at supporting community-based programs to prevent and reduce substance abuse. Each grantee will receive up to $125,000 per year in federal matching funds for a 5-year cycle. The application deadline is March 21.

HHS Names Autism Panel

The Health and Human Services department has named a new committee, authorized under the Combating Autism Act of 2006, to facilitate the exchange of information on autism activities among federal agencies as well as coordinate autism-related programs and initiatives, according to a statement from HHS. Dr. Thomas R. Insel, director of the National Institutes of Mental Health, will chair the panel; its first task will be to develop a strategic plan for autism research to guide public and private investments.

Scant Number of New Approvals

The Food and Drug Administration approved only 17 new molecular entities (NMEs) in 2007, the lowest number since 2002. This comes on the heels of two previous years with only 18 NME approvals each. NMEs are unique products. Those approved in 2007 included two HIV therapies; four oncology products; two antihypertensives; one antibiotic; and one NME each to treat Parkinson's disease, pulmonary hypertension, impetigo, acromegaly, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, and phenylketonuria. Also approved were an imaging agent and injection to prevent the loss of blood volume during surgery as well as a handful of biologics, an influenza vaccine, and an avian flu vaccine.

Coverage Improves Health

Uninsured adults 55-64 years old, particularly those with cardiovascular disease or diabetes, saw their health improve significantly once they became eligible for Medicare, a study from Harvard Medical School, Boston, reported. The study looked at more than 5,000 adults who were continuously insured and more than 2,200 who were uninsured persistently or intermittently in the decade before they became eligible for Medicare. The researchers found that, compared with previously insured adults, previously uninsured adults reported significantly improved health trends after age 65, both overall and for measures related to mobility, agility, and adverse cardiovascular outcomes. Depressive symptoms did not improve significantly in uninsured individuals with these other conditions once they became eligible for Medicare, but depressive symptoms did improve in previously uninsured adults without these other conditions once they became eligible for Medicare. By age 70, the differences in health status between the previously uninsured and those who had been insured continuously were reduced by about half. The study appeared in the Dec. 26 issue of JAMA.

Consortium Starts Genome Project

A consortium of research organizations from around the world, including the National Human Genome Research Institute, is planning to sequence the genomes of at least 1,000 individuals. The idea, being called the 1000 Genomes Project, is to create a detailed and clinically relevant picture of human genetic variation. The data from the project will be made publicly available at no cost. “This new project will increase the sensitivity of disease discovery efforts across the genome fivefold and within gene regions at least 10-fold,” Dr. Francis S. Collins, director of the National Human Genome Research Institute, said in a statement. “Our existing databases do a reasonably good job of cataloging variations found in at least 10 percent of a population. By harnessing the power of new sequencing technologies and novel computational methods, we hope to give biomedical researchers a genome-wide map of variation down to the 1 percent level.” The project is being supported by the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in Hinxton, England; the Beijing Genomics Institute; BGI Shenzhen in China; and the National Human Genome Research Institute, part of the National Institutes of Health. More information about the project is available online at

www.1000genomes.org

Policy & Practice