The lede item necessarily is this Fortune Well warning dated August 13

• “Patients who take blockbuster drugs like Wegovy or Ozempic for weight loss may face life-threatening complications if they need surgery or other procedures that require empty stomachs for anesthesia. This summer’s guidance to halt the medication for up to a week may not go far enough, either.
• “Some anesthesiologists in the U.S. and Canada say they’ve seen growing numbers of patients on the weight-loss drugs who inhaled food and liquid into their lungs while sedated because their stomachs were still full — even after following standard instructions to stop eating for six to eight hours in advance.”
• The drugs can slow digestion so much that it puts patients at increased risk for the problem called pulmonary aspiration, which can cause dangerous lung damage, infections and even death, said Dr. Ion Hobai, an anesthesiologist at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.
• “This is such a serious sort of potential complication that everybody who takes this drug should know about it,” said Hobai, who was among the first to flag the issue.

From the healthcare policy front —

• Congress is on a State/District work break this week. There are no out-of-town hearings scheduled.

• NPR Shots predicts that a recently proposed rule will improve hospital price transparency. Fingers crossed.

From the public health front –

• Fortune Well identifies and explains the four daily habits of “truly happy” people.

• The Drug Enforcement Administration’s public education website explains the dangers of
  • “Xylazine – often called “tranq” – is a drug adulterant that DEA has detected in a growing number of overdose deaths, despite the FDA authorizing it only for veterinary use.
  • “Illicitly-used xylazine is most often reported in combinations with two or more substances present, such as fentanyl, cocaine, or heroin, and can increase the potential for these drugs to cause fatal overdoses.”

• Cardiovascular Business points out that,
  • “The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has announced that Datascope, a subsidiary of Getinge, is recalling certain Cardiosave intra-aortic balloon pumps (IABPs) due to a risk that the devices could stop working unexpectedly. This is a Class I recall, which means the FDA believes using one of these IABPs “may cause serious injuries or death.” 
  • “These devices are designed to provide temporary support to a patient’s left ventricle. Electrical failures have caused some of them to turn off with no warning, however, putting the patient’s health at immediate risk. 
  • “Using an affected pump may cause serious adverse health events, including unstable blood pressure, injury (for example: inadequate blood supply or a vital organ injury), and death,” according to the FDA’s advisory.”
  • This is the fourth cardiac care device to be recalled in 2023.

• mHealth Intelligence says that “Using survey data on patient attitudes toward mental health services and depression screening, a new study indicated that Black American Women are comfortable with using voice or video calls to communicate with mental health providers.”

• Patient Engagement HIT informs us,
  • Only a fifth of the nearly 2.5 million adults with opioid use disorder received medication for the disease 2021, leaving millions without access to addiction treatment, according to new data from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
  • The report, published as a research note in JAMA Network Open, also showed sociodemographic health disparities in opioid use disorder treatment access, with Black people, women, individuals who were unemployed, and those in non-metropolitan areas being less likely to receive treatment.
  • The study looked particularly at medication-assisted treatment, or MAT, which is considered the gold standard in OUD therapy. Drugs like buprenorphine, methadone, and naltrexone have all proven effective for OUD treatment.

In early medical/drug research news,

• Precision Vaccinations reports
  • While the U.S. government has recently licensed monoclonal antibody therapies (LEQEMBI®), anti-amyloid vaccines may offer a convenient, affordable, and accessible means of preventing and treating Alzheimer’s Disease (AD).
  • The Lancet’s eBioMedicine recently published a paper that concludes that an immunotherapeutic vaccine candidate targeting toxic forms of aggregated beta-amyloid in the brain to treat and prevent AD.
  • Published on July 29, 2023, this research paper concludes Vaxxinity, Inc. UB-311 is an active immunotherapy, “was safe and well-tolerated,” with early clinical data demonstrating a trend for slowing cognitive decline in mild Alzheimer’s disease (AD).
  • And UB-311 could offer multiple competitive advantages over licensed passive immunotherapies, including less frequent dosing, a more convenient mode of administration, improved accessibility, and cost-effectiveness.

From the U.S. healthcare business front,

• Healthcare Dive reports
  • “Federal spending on Medicare Advantage bonus payments has risen every year since 2015, and will reach at least $12.8 billion this year — an increase of nearly 30% from 2022, according a new KFF analysis.
  • “Rapid growth in bonus payments has implications for Medicare spending and beneficiary premiums, especially since spending on the bonuses has grown faster than MA enrollment overall, researchers said.
  • “UnitedHealthcare — the biggest MA insurer — will receive the largest total payments at $3.9 billion. Kaiser Permanente has the highest per-enrollee bonuses at $523.”
• and
  • “The Department of Justice is requesting more data from Amedisys regarding its proposed $3.3 billion acquisition by UnitedHealth, a move that will push back the timeline of the deal.
  • “The home health and hospice provider disclosed in a filing with the SEC on Thursday that it received a second request for information from regulators on August 4 regarding the merger.
  • “UnitedHealth announced plans to acquire Amedisys in June, after the Louisiana-based provider reneged on an existing merger agreement with Option Care Health.”