Content about healthcare

LOUISVILLE, Ky. Baptist Healthcare System, which operates a network of hospitals and other facilities throughout the state, is looking to expand the number of clinics it operates inside select Walmart locations, according to a local news report.

Baptist Healthcare System currently operates six Baptist Express Care clinics at six Walmart stores in the state.

According to Business First of Louisville, the healthcare system is looking to open 24 clinics in such areas as Middletown and Shelbyville, Nicholasville and Somerset, Ky.

BURLINGTON, Mass. The market for hypertension drugs will drop by $3 billion by the end of the decade due to generic competition, according to a new report by healthcare market research firm Decision Resources.

The report, announced Tuesday, found that the market for drugs to treat high blood pressure would decline from 2009’s $26 billion to $23 billion by 2019 in the United States, United Kingdom, France, Italy, Spain and Japan.

WHAT IT MEANS AND WHY IT'S IMPORTANT The news that San Francisco's board of supervisors gave preliminary approval to ban tobacco sales at all retailers that operate pharmacies, including mass merchants and grocers, is a step in the right direction, because if drug stores are going to be banned from selling them, then all retail pharmacy outlets should be banned. However, there's an even bigger picture to consider.

SAN RAMON, Calif. The Special Interest Group for IIAS Standards announced Wednesday that the group is making significant changes to its Eligible Products List — a list of over-the-counter products eligible for reimbursement under flexible spending accounts — in response to IRS guidance issued earlier this month.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. California health officials and healthcare professionals are urging Californians to get vaccinated, as the state is on pace for the worst epidemic of pertussis, more commonly known as whooping cough, in more than 50 years. The disease already has claimed the lives of nine infants in the state.

WASHINGTON More money is flowing from the federal stimulus coffers to states as the White House continues its push to drive the healthcare system’s massive transformation to a digital and information technology-based platform.