MedCity News

FDA Drug Approval Marks a First for a Disease — But It’s Not Autism

Aerial view of a large number of miniature ai chatbots

Epic Is Letting Health Systems Build Their Own Agents — But Are They Ready?

Epic has unveiled its new “agent factory,” a platform that lets health systems build AI agents that are capable of orchestrating entire workflows across the EHR.

By Katie Adams

Opinion

The Lethal Cost of Regulatory Perfection in Rare Disease

Congress has already granted the FDA flexibility in evaluating therapies for rare diseases, including the use of real-world evidence and natural history data when traditional large-scale trials are not feasible. The question before the FDA now is not if those tools can be applied – they can – but if the agency has the courage to use them before more patients lose their autonomy, and ultimately, their lives, to rare disease.

By Dr. Patricia Greenstein

MedCity Influencers

When Recalls Fail — The Gap Between Notification and Action

For patients, recalls can fail to protect them — not because they came too late, but because they stop at notification and never fully translate into action.

By Guillermo Ramas

Latest Video

Latest News

MedCity Influencers

Rethinking Where Patient Recruitment Begins

The patients are there. Our recruitment models just aren’t reaching them. Digital patient recruitment is proving to be not just an alternative, but an even more effective approach.

By Suzanne Harris

Devices & Diagnostics, Health Tech

stryker office in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA, on May 9, 2023., Stryker Corporation is an American multinational medical technologies corporation.

6 Things to Know About Stryker’s Cyberattack

Stryker was hit by a cyberattack this week that knocked out its internal systems worldwide and caused delays to order processing and manufacturing. An Iran-linked group has claimed responsibility for the attack, but the full impact remains unclear.

By Katie Adams

How Artera is Using Agentic AI to Humanize Patient Care

Artera President Tom McIntyre talks about the practical application of AI in healthcare.

By Artera and MedCity News

Health Tech

Report: Virtual GI Solutions Save Money, Improve Patient Symptoms

A report from the Peterson Health Technology Institute found that virtual gastrointestinal solutions can improve symptoms for patients with Irritable Bowel Syndrome and Inflammatory Bowel Disease while lowering healthcare spending.

By Marissa Plescia

BioPharma, Startups, Artificial Intelligence

Startup Waiv Spins Out of Owkin With $33M to Bring AI Precision to Cancer Decisions

Waiv, formerly the diagnostics division of AI biotech Owkin, developed AI-enabled testing technologies that found use in clinical settings and in cancer drug research. Spinning out as an independent company enables Waiv to pursue its own growth strategy, co-founder and CEO Meriem Sefta said.

By Frank Vinluan

MedCity Influencers

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How Moneyball Economics in Healthcare is Taking Shape with AI

Full schedules and broad outreach look productive, but they are a mirage. Real value comes from using data to hunt for the patients who matter most: the ones whose care drives stronger outcomes and higher margins.

By Conrad Gudmundson

The Mechanics of a More Connected Healthcare Ecosystem [Video]

Arbiter’s Anjali Jameson on hospital and payer alignment.

By Arbiter and MedCity News

MedCity Influencers

The Aging Crisis Is Here, and Technology Is No Longer Optional

We need to pivot from a deficiency to an abundance model – from over-focusing on what an individual cannot do, to making the most of the physical and mental resources at hand to maximize independence, dignity, and quality of life. This includes rethinking physical environments and thoughtfully embedding technology to support capability rather than limitation as we adapt to a new reality.

By Luka Zrnic

Health Tech

‘They Need Each Other’: Why Hims & Hers and Novo Nordisk Made Up

Novo Nordisk dropped its lawsuit against Hims & Hers and launched a new collaboration. The deal is advantageous for both companies, experts say.

By Marissa Plescia

Balancing the Role of Physicians and AI [Video]

At the ViVE conference in LA, Smarter Technologies Chief Medical Officer Ruben Amarasingham MD talked with Katie Adams about the company's larger goals for AI: to improve the accuracy of data and make healthcare less burdensome for physicians and clinicians.

By Smarter Technologies and MedCity News

Artificial Intelligence, Health Tech, Consumer / Employer, Providers

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Microsoft Enters Healthcare Chatbot Race with Copilot Health

Microsoft launched Copilot Health, an AI model that pulls together users’ medical records, wearable data and trusted health information. The move comes amid a wave of other tech companies announcing healthcare-focused large language models for consumers, including Anthropic, OpenAI and Amazon.

By Katie Adams

BioPharma, Pharma

FDA Transparency Push Expands to Monitoring Safety of Vaccines and Other Regulated Products

The FDA said consolidating safety reporting into a single platform, the Adverse Event Monitoring System (AEMS), will increase transparency and reduce costs. But like the legacy systems it replaces, AEMS reports are unverified so causation and frequency of events cannot be determined.

By Frank Vinluan

Policy

Debunked Episode 24: PBM Reform Brainstorm, Elevance Faces CMS Penalty Risk, Hims & Hers’ Eucalyptus Deal Takeaways

In the latest episode of the Debunked Podcast, the discussion revolved around the Break Up Big Medicine legislation to rein in healthcare giants and ways to introduce meaningful PBM reform.

By Stephanie Baum

MedCity Influencers

Doctor at work. Medical professional using tablet in clinic office. Medicine and health care concept.

Myths vs. Reality: The High-Stakes of Medication Adherence Amid America’s Expanding Pharmacy Deserts

It’s time to break down the myths holding the pharmacy sector back, and the emerging realities shaping a new, tech-enabled approach to adherence that blends operational redesign, AI innovation and equity-focused care.

By Asher Perzigian

Opinion

Prompting is Not Clinical Practice: The Limits Of General LLMs in Healthcare

General-purpose LLMs have meaningful value in healthcare - they can support education, documentation and research - as well as lower barriers to knowledge and help improve communication. But acting as a clinical assistant embedded in care delivery requires more - it needs longitudinal EHR grounding, explicit encoding of clinical guidelines, transparent and traceable reasoning and the ability to operate securely at a population scale.

By Vibhor Gupta and Jingqing Zhang

MedCity Influencers

3d rendering of radioactive intravenous drug using a needle and syringe to inject a drug

An AI Driven Approach to Address the Non-Responder Gap in Radiopharmaceutical Therapy

The non-responder gap matters for two reasons: First, patients who are in an advanced stage of cancer lose valuable time in ineffective therapy. Second, it increases the cost of therapy and resources for both patients and the broader healthcare ecosystem.

By Jayashri Pawar

Artificial Intelligence, Health Tech, Patient Engagement, Providers

Ai chatbot interface on a screen with glowing pink speech bubbles representing conversation and coding language for artificial intelligence development

Amazon One Medical CMO: AI Is the Front Door to Healthcare

Amazon One Medical expanded access to its AI-powered health assistant, allowing anyone on the Amazon website or app to ask medical questions, interpret lab results and connect to care if needed. The chatbot reflects a broader trend of AI becoming a first stop for Americans navigating the healthcare system.

By Katie Adams

BioPharma, Startups

Startup Vima Adds Parkinson’s to Movement Disorder Scope, Expanding Series A Round to $100M

Vima Therapeutics is expanding to Parkinson’s disease following early clinical results showed proof of concept for its drug in isolated dystonia, a rare neurological movement disorder. The startup says its drug could address the biology underpinning many movement disorders.

By Frank Vinluan