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Information Technology

Women throughout Maine will have greater access to abortions under a reproductive health group's plan to connect them with doctors over video conference.

Pharmaceuticals

Physicians are increasingly promoting drugs and devices in social media posts on sites like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, but they rarely disclose that they have been paid tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars by the products' manufacturers. While physicians aren't required to disclose financial ties in social media posts by law, some critics worry about the ethics of the practice.

Top lobbyist for drugmakers threads thicket of outrage | New York Times

Last November Steven Ubl became chief of Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), the drug industry's top lobbying organization, amid consumer and lawmaker outrage over the high cost of prescription drugs. Ubl, who previously lead the Advanced Medical Technology Association, discusses the pricing controversy, his goals for PhRMA and the industry and the possibility of value-based payments for drugs.

Safety, Quality and Clinical Practice

Researchers at the University of Exeter Medical School in England say they have found that children who develop the disease by age 7 typically have a more aggressive version of the disease than those diagnosed as teens. Younger children initially develop insulitis, which kills off almost all the insulin-producing beta cells in their pancreas, while teens retain malfunctioning versions of the cells. Researchers say that may help them develop different, more effective treatments for both groups.

Local hospitals lend hand to medical advances | Bismarck (N.D.) Tribune

Experts at Sanford Health and CHI St. Alexius Health are working in such areas as genomic testing, devising cures for diabetes and treating cancers that will take North Dakota into a health care system that is expected to be more centralized with less invasive surgical options.