health
Rare disease patients caught in Trump's crosshairs
Kayana Szymczak for STAT
Global partnerships are a critical part of research on rare diseases — with so few patients to study in any one country, scientists have to search far and wide to identify the causes and test potential treatments. But as the Trump administration began allowing NIH grant reviews to resume this spring after a months-long pause, it also quietly tightened its requirements for applications with a foreign component. Now, forgetting to include a single document regarding a project's foreign collaborators is grounds for a withdrawal without review (meaning the grant application gets denied).
"In the grand scheme of things, it's not that much money for the federal government," said Ellyn Kodroff, pictured above. "But it's so devastating for this community." Kodroff's daughter has a rare digestive disorder and recently was able to begin an experimental treatment at the NIH Clinical Center. But the group running the trial had its latest funding request withdrawn because of the forgotten document.
It's not the only group that's been affected, STAT's Megan Molteni learned. And the move is just the first in a much more sweeping effort to limit funding for foreign scientists. Read more from Megan on what the effects will be.
And another thing
Wildfire smoke is also still really bad for you
Hundreds of wildfires burning across the Canadian provinces of Manitoba and Saskatchewan are pushing smoke across Canada and the American northeast. Canadian towns close to the wildfires are experiencing the worst of the smoke pollution, but even here in Boston, there was a brief ground stop at the airport Monday due to smoke and haze.
It's getting better, but here's a reminder:
- Wildfire smoke is particularly harmful to kids' respiratory health. One study found that a 10-unit increase of fine particulate matter from wildfire smoke was associated with a 30% spike in pediatric admissions for respiratory problems. "It's quite a big bit of a difference," the lead author said.
- Researchers have found that people who live in areas with high levels of fine particulate matter could have a greater risk of developing dementia, with a particularly strong link seen between the condition and exposure to wildfire emissions. Still, there are a lot of questions remaining about other long-term effects.
- In California, between 2008 and 2010, somewhere between 52,480 and 55,710 people died prematurely due to chronic exposure to wildfire smoke. The economic impact of those deaths was at least $432 billion.
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For doctors, patient complaints beget … industry payments?
The more unsolicited complaints from patients that doctors receive, the more likely they are to take higher payments from industry, according to a study published yesterday in JAMA Network Open.
Researchers analyzed data from almost 72,000 doctors whose clinics participate in the Patient Advocacy Reporting System Index. Complaints logged there were cross-referenced with data on the same physicians in the Open Payments Program database. Those who had higher PARS scores — which are calculated with the number and the severity of patient complaints — were significantly more likely to accept general payments (meaning not for research), particularly for higher amounts.
Male physicians and those practicing in nonacademic settings were also more likely to accept larger general payments. The results demonstrate an urgent need for clinics to address conflict and trust between physicians and patients and to strengthen the management of financial conflicts of interest.
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