African American Woman Tests Blood Sugar

By Serena Gordon
HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, May 17 (HealthDay News) — Many people know diabetes — both type 1 and type 2 — can take a serious toll on physical health. But these blood-sugar disorders also can affect your emotions and, in turn, your emotions can wreak havoc on your diabetes control.

[Read: Common Plastics Chemical Might Boost Diabetes Risk.]

More recent research in people with type 1 diabetes has found that long periods of high blood-sugar levels can trigger the production of a hormone linked to the development of depression.

People with type 1 diabetes no longer can make their own insulin; people with type 2 diabetes need insulin treatment because their bodies can no longer produce it in sufficient quantities.

“Diabetes gives you so much to worry about that it’s exhausting. It can make you feel powerless,” said Joe Solowiejczyk, a certified diabetes educator and a manager of diabetes counseling and training at the Johnson amp; Johnson Diabetes Institute in Milpitas, Calif. “I think it’s important to acknowledge that, from time to time, you’re going to have a meltdown. You’re going to have days when you feel exasperated, frustrated, sad, in denial and physically exhausted.”

Solowiejczyk, who has type 1 diabetes himself, said these feelings become a problem “when you’re not able to get on with your life, and you’re persistently not taking care of your diabetes.”

Not only does diabetes increase the risk of serious health complications, but uncontrolled diabetes also may worsen depression, causing a vicious cycle.

In addition to an increased risk of depression, diabetes can affect mood even from minute to minute. For example, someone who experiences low blood sugar may suddenly become irritable, even combative, and may act as if they are drunk, slurring their words.

Low blood-sugar levels (also known as hypoglycemia) occur when someone has taken too much insulin or hasn’t eaten enough food. Exercise, alcohol and many other factors can lower blood-sugar levels unpredictably.

The problem, Solowiejczyk said, is “that the brain operates totally on glucose. When you don’t have enough glucose, things start breaking down and your cognitive function doesn’t work that well. This is a physiological, not an emotional, response.”

Dr. Vivian Fonseca, president of medicine and science for the American Diabetes Association, said, “Hypoglycemia reactions are very understandable. There are also some fluctuations that are not quite in the hypoglycemia range that may affect anxiety levels.”

[Read: Mouse Study Hints at New Path for Diabetes Treatment.]

High blood-sugar levels (hyperglycemia) also can lead to mood changes. “Hyperglycemia can affect your ability to concentrate and can make you feel grouchy,” Solowiejczyk said. “Any change in the blood sugar outside of the normal ranges makes you feel weird and uncomfortable.”

A small study in the April issue of the journal Diabetes Technology amp; Therapeutics found that frequent fluctuations in blood-sugar levels in women with type 2 diabetes were associated with a lower quality of life and negative moods.

Fonseca said, however, it’s important for these findings to be replicated in a larger population.

Although diabetes and blood-sugar levels can affect emotions, emotions also can affect patients’ blood-sugar levels and diabetes control.

In another study in the same journal issue, researchers tested blood-sugar levels in non-diabetic bungee jumpers, and found that the stress of the jump caused their blood-sugar levels to rise significantly. Not surprisingly, their stress hormones also were higher due to the body’s normal fight-or-flight response. When this happens, the liver releases glucose to make energy available to the body’s cells, according to the American Diabetes Association.

Article source: http://health.usnews.com/health-news/news/articles/2012/05/18/diabetes-can-take-a-toll-on-your-emotions

HARTFORD, Conn.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–

SCIOinspire Corp., a premier health analytics services player, announced
that—along with its partners Finity Communications and Health Partners
of Philadelphia—it has been awarded a $4.9 million, three-year Health
Care Innovation grant from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid
Services (CMS). The funds will be used to develop technology-enabled
programs to improve health care for high-need populations in the Greater
Philadelphia area.

The grant was one of 26—selected from a field of more than 3,000
applicants—announced by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen
Sebelius on May 8. The grant program, funded through the Affordable Care
Act, ultimately will support a total of 100 projects and disburse
approximately $900 million.

“We can’t wait to support innovative projects that will save money and
make our health care system stronger,” says Sebelius. “It’s yet another
way we are supporting local communities now in their efforts to provide
better care and lower costs.” According to HHS, this challenge grant
program is designed to support applicants who propose “compelling new
models of service delivery/payment improvements that hold the promise of
delivering the three-part aim of better health, better health care, and
lower costs through improved quality for Medicare, Medicaid, and
Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) enrollees.”

The grant money awarded to SCIOinspire and its partners will support the
use of health information technology and peer mentoring to empower
interested Health Partners of Philadelphia plan members to improve their
health status. This comprehensive approach to health care is expected to
reduce the total cost of care through prevention, maintaining wellness,
and management of disease and chronic conditions with estimated savings
of approximately $8.7 million.

“This award presents an opportunity for SCIOinspire, Finity and Health
Partners to make a measurable difference in the health of a specific
population,” notes Siva Namasivayam, Chief Executive Officer for
SCIOinspire. “Combining our proven analytics-driven solutions with
expert mentoring and outreach will help drive better care and lower
costs.”

“This grant speaks directly to our health-data-driven chronic member
identification and engagement technology expertise,” adds Bart Bracken,
SVP and COO of the Health Analytics division of SCIOinspire. “We look
forward to working alongside our partners to deliver a superior level of
healthcare service to those most in need in the Philadelphia area.”

About SCIOinspire

Based in Farmington, Connecticut, SCIOinspire is a leading health
analytics services company, serving more than 50 health care payers and
care organizations including 15 of the top 25 insurers that represent
more than 80 million members. Through the use of integrated healthcare
data and proprietary algorithms and technologies, SCIOinspire focuses on
providing actionable analytics, business services and insights in the
areas of payment integrity, value-based benefit design, consumer
engagement, economic modeling, and outcomes measurement to improve
healthcare services and results. For more information about SCIOinspire,
please visit www.scioinspire.com.

About Finity Communications

Finity Communications is a leading provider of systems-based technology
and communication solutions for some of the largest health plan
providers in the U.S. Finity is the creator of the EveryBODY Get Healthy
closed-loop system that is the platform for the Innovation project. Our
mission is to empower individuals to make conscious health and wellness
decisions. For more information about Finity, please visit www.finity.com.

About Health Partners

Health Partners is a not-for-profit health plan serving nearly 170,000
members in the Greater Philadelphia region. Its HealthChoices Medicaid
plan consistently ranks number one in the area for member satisfaction
in an annual consumer survey; is rated as “Excellent,” the highest level
possible, by the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA); and
was the first plan in the nation to receive NCQA’s Multicultural Health
Care Distinction. In 2009, the company launched KidzPartners, which
provides free or low-cost health insurance to uninsured children and
teens through CHIP, Pennsylvania’s Children’s Health Insurance Program.
Founded more than 25 years ago, Health Partners is one of the few
hospital-owned health plans in the country and has received national
recognition for its innovations in managed care. For more information
about Health Partners, please visit www.healthpart.com.

For SCIOinspire Corp.
Dodge Communications
Elizabeth Glaser, 770-576-2551
eglaser@dodgecommuncations.com

Article source: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/scioinspire-receives-prestigious-health-care-181300626.html

(Reuters) – Adding Johnson Johnson’s advanced prostate cancer drug, Zytiga, to hormone therapy before surgery has been shown for the first time to eradicate tumors in some men with high-risk forms of the disease.

The mid-stage trial found that six months of treatment with the combination therapy completely or nearly eliminated the cancer in a third of patients, all of whom had localized, aggressive cancer.

“These results are very impressive, especially given these high-risk patients,” Dr Mary-Ellen Taplin, associate professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and the study’s lead author, said at a news conference.

Zytiga is already approved to treat advanced prostate cancer in patients who previously received chemotherapy. JJ expects to file in the second half of this year for U.S. regulatory approval of the drug as a treatment for men with metastatic prostate cancer who have not yet received chemotherapy.

Zytiga, also known as abiraterone, costs about $5,000 a month. It is a member of a new drug class designed to work inside cancer cells to block production of testosterone, the male hormone that fuels prostate cancer cell growth.

Localized high-risk disease is defined as prostate cancer in men with high levels of prostate-specific antigen and aggressive disease that has spread throughout the prostate.

Men with this stage of disease tend to have a poor prognosis, and the cancer often spreads to other parts of the body despite aggressive treatment with available therapies, according to the American Society of Clinical Oncology, which featured the Zytiga data ahead of its annual meeting in Chicago, June 1-5.

“Theoretically … when you get a complete disappearance of the primary cancer, patient outcomes are much better,” said oncologist Dr. Nicholas Vogelzang, chair of ASCO’s cancer communications committee, who was not involved in the research. He noted that such pre-surgery treatment has become standard care for other types of cancer.

The Phase 2 trial looked at the effect of adding Zytiga to Lupron, a drug designed to trick the testicles into ceasing production of testosterone.

Of the 29 men who received the drugs for six months before having prostate surgery, the prostates of three had no evidence of cancer and seven had nearly complete elimination of the disease. In the group of men treated for three months before their surgery, 15 percent had little to no detectable cancer in the prostate.

Researchers said the therapy was well-tolerated by both groups. They reported five cases of elevated liver enzymes and three patients with lower-than-normal levels of potassium.

“Our findings suggest that this combination therapy approach could improve outcomes for a substantial number of men,” Taplin said. “This is a 58-patient trial with a very, very expensive drug, so I don’t think anybody is going to be encouraging this type of treatment without more data.”

She said other trials are under way, including a similar trial combining Zytiga with experimental drug ARN-509, which is being developed by Aragon Pharmaceuticals.

(Reporting By Deena Beasley in Los Angeles; editing by Matthew Lewis)

Article source: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/j-j-drug-shows-promise-035351778.html

Adding Zytiga (abiraterone) to conventional hormonal treatments
eliminated or nearly eliminated the prostate cancer in one-third of men
with this often-lethal form, according to new research to be presented at
next month’s annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology
(ASCO) in Chicago.

“This is one of the first — if not the first — study to show that you
can make prostate cancer in the prostate gland itself disappear in a
reproducible number of patients,” ASCO official Dr. Nicholas Vogelzang
said at a Wednesday press conference.

Commenting on the findings, Dr. Jay Brooks, chairman of
hematology/oncology at Ochsner Health System in Baton Rouge, said, “This
is exciting. It’s a novel way to eliminate cancer before surgery.”

However, Brooks, who was not involved in the study, cautioned that the
findings were still preliminary and need further investigation.

Trying to shrink a tumor with chemotherapy and/or radiation before
surgery is standard for other types of cancer, such as breast or colon,
but hasn’t to date shown a benefit in prostate cancer, study author Dr.
Mary-Ellen Taplin, associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical
School and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, explained at the news
conference.

Localized high-risk prostate cancer, which is defined as prostate
cancer in men with a prostate-specific antigen level above 20, high-grade
disease (a Gleason score of 8 or more), and stage T3 disease (indicating
the tumor has spread through the prostate), carries with it a poor
prognosis.

Standard hormonal therapy, which stops the production of male hormones
(androgens), has not been shown to be effective in this type of cancer
when given before surgery. Nor has the surgery, which removes the entire
prostate.

Zytiga blocks production of testosterone, which can promote the growth
of prostate cancer cells, but in a different way than established hormonal
treatments.

This small, phase 2 trial involved 56 men with an average age of 58,
all of whom had had at least three positive biopsies for prostate cancer.

For the first three months, 27 men received the standard hormonal
therapy leuprolide alone, followed by leuprolide plus Zytiga for another
three months.

The remaining 29 men received the two-drug combination for the whole
six months, after which all men in both groups underwent prostate surgery.

One-third of the men who had received leuprolide plus Zytiga for the
entire six months saw complete or nearly complete elimination of their
cancer.

By comparison, only 15 percent of men in the other group experienced
these results, the investigators found.

Those who received the combination for only 12 weeks had much lower
response rates.

The participants also received low doses of the steroid prednisone to
prevent side effects from Zytiga, although side effects overall were
minimal, said Taplin.

It’s not clear at this point why some men responded to the combination
therapy while others did not, and that is an area that needs to be
studied, the researchers said.

“In highly select people who have this aggressive type of prostate
cancer, I think this is an important area to investigate,” Brooks noted.
“We need to figure out which patients would potentially benefit.”

According to study author Taplin, the research received some funding
from
Johnson Johnson, the maker of Zytiga. She said the drug is currently
U.S. Food and Drug Administration-approved for patients with advanced
prostate cancer that does not respond to hormone therapy, and costs about
$5,000 per month.

The data and conclusions of research presented at medical meetings
should be viewed as preliminary until published in a peer-reviewed
journal.

More information

The U.S. National Cancer Institute has more on treatments
for prostate cancer.

Article source: http://news.yahoo.com/advanced-prostate-cancer-drug-may-help-earlier-stage-231827705.html

Barnes, a Durham mom of one, pulled over on the side of the road, got out a notebook and began to jot down her ideas. It would be a website, there would be blogs, maybe some kind of annual conference. It would be a place where women with diabetes could come together to talk, vent, share and support each other.

“The whole point was to connect and learn from each other,” Barnes tells me.

Barnes knows the need for women with diabetes to find support. At 15, the active, healthy high school basketball player was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes, which accounts for about 5 percent to 10 percent of diagnosed diabetes in the United States. Scientists don’t know what causes the autoimmune disease, but they think genetic and environmental factors, even viruses, could be involved in Type 1.

The diagnosis changed her life, forcing her to think about every morsel and sip that she takes. But during a hospital stay when she was first diagnosed, she decided she’d make it a positive part of her life. She decided that if she were going to have to live with diabetes, there must be a good reason.

“I did have control over how I was going to handle it and present it to the world,” she remembers thinking in her hospital bed.

Barnes went on to lead a diabetes support group when she was a student at UNC-Chapel Hill. She worked in clinical research and eventually pharmaceutical sales, selling diabetes medications. A sales meeting was the reason she was driving on I-95 that fall day in 2007.

A month later, she mentioned her idea to her husband Chris. Before she was done explaining it, he stopped her and gave her his full support.

Diabetes Sisters launched in January 2008 and the response was immediate. Women came to the site. Word spread through the network she’d created as a pharmaceutical sales representative.

Today, Diabetes Sisters has 10,000 members around the country with more than a dozen support groups for women, including some in the Triangle. The site also includes blogs, health information, expert advice, forums and stories about women and diabetes.

Her goal is to connect, but also put a healthy face on diabetes. She wants to show women that they can live a happy, productive life with the disease.

“Because diabetes poses one of the greatest threats to women’s health, it is time to get serious about addressing women’s unique challenges with the disease,” she said. “Women with diabetes have faced increased health risks such as depression, cardiovascular disease, eating disorders, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol for far too long. Most Americans — and even women with diabetes themselves — are unaware that these increased risks even exist.”

While men have diabetes too, Barnes said it’s especially important for women to talk and share. The disease can be affected by hormones. Women’s life stages, including puberty, pregnancy and menopause, can all make the disease more difficult to manage.

For Barnes, her pregnancy with her daughter was a particularly rough patch as she had to check her blood sugar 15 to 20 times a day. She worried constantly that her health was having an impact on her unborn child growing inside of her.

“I felt like I wasted a lot of the great parts of pregnancy,” she said. “They were secondary to the constant anxiety.”

Now Barnes is gearing up for Diabetes Sisters’ third annual conference in Raleigh. The event is May 18 to May 20 at the downtown Raleigh Marriott City Center.

The conference, which is drawing people from around the country, will include exercise sessions, workshops and other gatherings. Natalie Strand, winner of The Amazing Race in 2010, will be the keynote speaker .She was part of the first winning female team and the first person with diabetes to win the TV competition.

The conference also includes the Orange:Will Diabetes Awareness Walk in downtown Raleigh on May 20. Barnes invites the public to participate in the walk or help raise money as a virtual walker. Among the virtual walkers this year is author and celebrity chef Paula Deen, who is raising money for programming and research to support women with diabetes through her personal fundraising page.

For details and registration information about the conference and the walk, click here.

Barnes would like to see Diabetes Sisters to continue to grow and connect women with diabetes. But thinking back to that day on the side of I-95, she never dreamed it would get this big.

“It’s more than I envisioned,” she said. “It has grown in so many ways.”

To hear more from Barnes, watch my video interview with her. Learn all about Diabetes Sisters on its website.

Go Ask Mom features local moms every Monday.

Article source: http://www.wral.com/lifestyles/goaskmom/blogpost/11063157/

DALLAS–(BUSINESS WIRE)–

Conifer Health Solutions today announced a 10-year agreement with
Catholic Health Initiatives (CHI) to provide revenue cycle services for
56 of CHI’s hospitals across the nation. Conifer will provide Patient
Access, Revenue Integrity, and Patient Financial Services to the CHI
hospitals. These CHI hospitals generate more than $6 billion in annual
patient revenue. Conifer, a subsidiary of Tenet Healthcare
Corporation (NYSE:THC – News), has more than 30 years of experience providing
hospitals with business process management solutions, which allow
hospitals to focus on patient care and quality while Conifer focuses on
improving and sustaining their financial performance.

Through this agreement, CHI will enhance its patient services and
revenue cycle operations, helping it to focus even more intently on
fulfilling its mission to create healthier communities. CHI expects to
stabilize its revenue cycle costs in the face of health reform, changes
in commercial payer reimbursement rates, expanding Medicaid eligibility,
and increasing investments in information technology. In response to
rising healthcare costs, providers are increasingly seeking to identify
means to enhance cost efficiency and capture incremental revenue. CHI’s
strategy of partnering with Conifer is an important validation of the
value healthcare providers place on mission critical revenue cycle
activities.

Conifer’s integration process will include the transition of CHI’s
revenue cycle employees to Conifer. These employees will remain in their
current locations, and job reductions are not anticipated to exceed
normal attrition. These revenue cycle employees will be trained and
equipped with Conifer’s industry-leading processes and technology. The
integration process is expected to be completed within 24 months. As
part of this agreement, CHI will receive a minority ownership position
in Conifer. No financial terms were disclosed.

“We have chosen to partner with Conifer and Tenet Healthcare for our
revenue cycle services because of their outstanding track record with
leading technology, tools and training,” said Dean Swindle, executive
vice president, business services and chief financial officer of CHI.
“As a part of our relationship with Conifer, we will develop products
and services to further improve patient experiences and reduce costs,
helping CHI enhance its mission of building healthier communities.”

“We are excited to be working with Catholic Health Initiatives to assist
them in building a strong, standardized platform to support their
hospitals,” said Stephen Mooney, president of Conifer Health Solutions.
“We welcome their skilled and talented revenue cycle team members into
our organization and appreciate the confidence CHI is showing in us to
contribute to making a positive difference for their patients and
hospitals.”

In a previously scheduled event, Conifer president Stephen Mooney will
be the featured speaker in Tenet Healthcare’s investor webcast series
today at 3:30 p.m. Central Time. To access the webcast go to the
investor relations section of Tenet’s website at www.tenethealth.com/investors.
A set of slides, which will be referred to during the presentation, is
available at the Company’s website.

About Conifer Health Solutions

Conifer Health Solutions is a healthcare business process management
services provider working to improve operational performance for more
than 330 hospitals and healthcare entities so they can better serve
their communities, communicate effectively with patients, and support
patient financial administration. We have a passion for maximizing
financial performance, while at the same time improving the patient
experience. We provide comprehensive operational management for revenue
cycle functions including patient access, revenue integrity, and patient
financial services. We also offer patient communications solutions to
optimize communication between providers and patients, including patient
education, outreach, scheduling, medical necessity screening and HCAHPS
(Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Provider and Systems Survey)
reporting. In addition to revenue cycle management and patient
communications, our service offerings have expanded to support risk and
capitation management, as well as ACO (Accountable Care Organization)
and bundled payment processing. For more information, call 1-877-CONIFER
or visit www.coniferhealth.com.

About Catholic Health Initiatives

Catholic Health Initiatives is a national nonprofit health organization
with headquarters in Englewood, Colo. The faith-based system operates in
19 states and includes 76 hospitals; 40 long-term care, assisted- and
residential-living facilities; two community health-services
organizations; two accredited nursing colleges; and home health
agencies. In fiscal year 2011, CHI provided more than $612 million in
charity care and community benefit, including services for the poor,
free clinics, education and research. With annual revenues of more than
$10.5 billion, CHI is the nation’s second-largest Catholic health care
system.

Conifer Health Solutions, Inc. is a wholly owned subsidiary of Tenet
Healthcare Corporation (NYSE:THC – News). Some of the statements in this
release may constitute forward-looking statements. Such statements are
based on our current expectations and could be affected by numerous
factors and are subject to various risks and uncertainties, certain of
which are discussed in Tenet’s filings with the Securities and Exchange
Commission, including its annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended
Dec. 31, 2011, quarterly reports on Form 10-Q, and periodic reports on
Form 8-K. Do not rely on any forward-looking statement, as we cannot
predict or control many of the factors that ultimately may affect our
ability to achieve the results estimated. We make no promise to update
any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of changes in
underlying factors, new information, future events or otherwise.

Article source: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/conifer-health-solutions-announces-strategic-200000691.html

IRVINE, Calif. LIEGE, Belgium–(BUSINESS WIRE)–

Regulatory News:

MDxHealth
SA (NYSE Euronext: MDXH), a leading molecular diagnostic company that
develops and commercializes epigenetic tests to support cancer
treatment, today announced the launch of ConfirmMDx™
for Prostate Cancer, a novel test that helps urologists distinguish
patients who have a true-negative prostate biopsy from those who may
have occult cancer. Testing will be performed in MDxHealth’s
state-of-the-art Irvine-based CLIA laboratory for physicians submitting
prostate tissue samples directly or via its exclusive co-marketing
partner PLUS Diagnostics.

“As many as one in four men could be misdiagnosed due to limitations
with current prostate biopsy procedures, commonly described as ‘sampling
error’. As a consequence, the standard of care for men with persistently
high-risk factors, but no evidence of prostate cancer in a biopsy, is
limited to continued surveillance and repeat biopsies, often on
prostate-cancer-free men. The ConfirmMDx for Prostate Cancer test
detects epigenetic changes associated with the presence or absence of
prostate cancer,” explained Prof Dr. Wim van Crienkinge, Chief
Scientific Officer of MDxHealth.

“The launch of ConfirmMDx for Prostate Cancer represents the culmination
of extensive research and development efforts and demonstrates the
commitment of the MDxHealth team to deliver on its new commercial
strategy,” said Dr. Jan Groen, CEO of MDxHealth. MDxHealth is uniquely
positioned with its portfolio of epigenetic assays to capitalize on the
realization of true personalized medicine, improving patient care, while
reducing healthcare costs.”

About
ConfirmMDx for Prostate Cancer

Over 650,000 American men receive a negative prostate biopsy result each
year; however approximately 25-35% of these results are false negative.
Under the current standard of care, prostate biopsy procedures collect
10-12 needle biopsy cores on average, effectively sampling less than 1%
of a man’s prostate. This approach leaves men at risk of occult cancer,
leading to a high rate of repeat biopsies, often on prostate-cancer-free
men. There is an unmet medical need for a clinically effective
diagnostic test to address this dilemma. ConfirmMDx for Prostate Cancer
is an epigenetic assay to help distinguish patients who have a
true-negative biopsy from those at risk for occult cancer. The test
helps urologists rule out prostate cancer-free men from undergoing
unnecessary repeat biopsies and, helps rule in high risk patients who
may require repeat biopsies and potential treatment. The test is able to
detect an epigenetic field effect or “halo” associated with the
cancerization process at the DNA level in cells adjacent to cancer foci.
This molecular “halo” around a cancer lesion can be present despite
having a normal appearance under the microscope. Thus ConfirmMDx for
Prostate Cancer aids urologists in identifying men who may forego
unnecessary repeat biopsies.

Please visit MDxHealth and PLUS Diagnostics at the American Urology
Association Annual Meeting, May 19-23 2012 in Atlanta, GA, booths #3831
and #3923.

About MDxHealth

MDxHealth is a molecular diagnostics company that develops and
commercializes advanced epigenetic tests for cancer assessment and the
personalized treatment of patients. By applying patented DNA methylation
platform and biomarkers, MDxHealth helps to address a large and growing
unmet medical need for better cancer diagnosis and treatment
information. For more information visit http://www.mdxhealth.com
and follow us on Twitter at: http://www.twitter.com/mdxhealth.

Dr. Jan Groen will present on MDxHealth at the 13^th annual
meeting BioEquity Europe that is taking place on May 15^th-16^th
in Frankfurt, Germany.

This press release contains forward-looking statements and estimates
with respect to the anticipated future performance of MDxHealth and the
market in which it operates. Such statements and estimates are based on
assumptions and assessments of known and unknown risks, uncertainties
and other factors, which were deemed reasonable but may not prove to be
correct. Actual events are difficult to predict, may depend upon factors
that are beyond the company’s control, and may turn out to be materially
different. MDxHealth expressly disclaims any obligation to update any
such forward-looking statements in this release to reflect any change in
its expectations with regard thereto or any change in events, conditions
or circumstances on which any such statement is based unless required by
law or regulation.

Article source: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/mdxhealth-launches-confirmmdx-prostate-cancer-060000495.html

HOUSTON–(BUSINESS WIRE)–

Encore Health Resources, a leading provider of advanced healthcare
information technology (IT) consulting services, announced today the
appointment of N. Clair Detraz as its new Partner, Corporate Planning.
Encore will draw on Mrs. Detraz’s deep experience in health systems,
academics, health IT, strategic planning, marketing, and quality
management as it continues to develop its unique solutions suite,
broaden its national sales and service talent, and increase its rapidly
growing revenue streams.

“After three short years since our founding, Encore owes its remarkable
growth and success to industry-recognized thought leadership, solutions,
and services that meet the needs of our clients in an era of
unprecedented transformation,” said Tom Niehaus, President and Chief
Operating Officer, Encore Health Resources. “At a time when innovation
is the cornerstone of survival, we will benefit from Clair’s deep
industry insights as we leverage health-IT-driven clinical and business
analytics to help clients surmount today’s healthcare reform demands
while preparing for a future of value-based care delivery.”

Mrs. Detraz joins Encore from CTG Health Solutions (CTG), where she was
most recently Vice President. In that position, she was responsible for
strategic planning, marketing, and the Quality Management Office for
CTG’s healthcare division. During her tenure at CTG, she also served as
corporate liaison to the College of Health Information Management
Executives (CHIME) and worked closely with chief information officers
(CIOs), strategic alliance partners, and the company’s sales and
consulting arms to design and launch services to optimally meet the
needs of the health IT industry. Before joining CTG, Mrs. Detraz served
as the CIO and Assistant Hospital Administrator for the University of
Kentucky Medical Center.

“The key to thriving in our industry’s shift from volume to value will
be capturing, analyzing, and effectively managing the right data to
provide the needed information. Health systems and emerging care
delivery organizations will require powerful analytics and business
intelligence capabilities to be nimble, responsive, and make effective,
timely clinical and business decisions,” said Mrs. Detraz. “I look
forward to helping Encore continue to create innovative, practical
solutions that anticipate our industry’s needs. Encore will be ready
when clients require our assistance in developing strategies, analytics,
and technology capabilities that they’ll need to meet healthcare reform
head on.”

About Encore Health Resources:

Since its founding in January 2009, Encore Health Resources has expanded
its employee base nearly 200% in 2010 and another 95% in 2011. Encore
increased its revenues by more than 400% between 2009 and 2010 and
another 115% over the course of 2011. For two years running, Encore
earned recognition as one of the Top
100 Best Places to Work in Healthcare by Modern Healthcare Magazine.
Last December, KLAS
Enterprises, LLC, honored Encore with a prestigious Best in KLAS Award
for excellence in Information Technology Planning and Assessment in a
first place tie for the category. Previously, in July, KLAS named Encore
one of the top two best overall health information technology advisory
services companies in the nation. In late November, the Houston
Business Journal named Encore as a Fast
Tech 50 finalist — an award recognizing Houston’s fastest-growing,
high-tech businesses — and as one of just three firms awarded its
Enterprise Champions award. The award is conferred on companies that
stand out in areas of community, innovation, corporate culture, and
overcoming challenges. For more information about Encore, please visit http://www.encorehealthresources.com/.

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