3-D mapping biopsy more effective than ultrasound-guided biopsy for finding prostate cancer; Public awareness of CT lung cancer screening still lacking;

News From Around the Web

> 3-D mapping biopsy is much more effective than ultrasound-guided biopsy at finding prostate cancer, according to a study out of the University of Colorado Cancer Center. In the study of 161 men who had been diagnosed with low-state prostate cancer by ultrasound-guided biopsy, 3-D mapping biopsy found nearly three times the number of cancerous zones per patient, compared to ultrasound-guided biopsy. Blog post

> CT screening to detect early stage lung cancers in smokers has yet to gather a significant level of awareness, considering the place the disease holds as America's most deadly form of cancer. According to Corey Langer, a professor of medicine at the Abrahamson Cancer Center at the University of Pennsylvania, lung cancer screening hasn't taken off the way breast or colon cancer screening has. Announcement

> Photon-counting in direct radiography can be an effective tool for mammography screening because it can improve image quality at a lower radiation dose, according to an article in the journal Radiology. For the study, German researchers found that the photon-counting direct radiography technique had a cancer detection rate of 0.76 percent for subsequent screening, compared to 0.59 percent for CR or DR systems. Article

Health Finance News

> Growth in healthcare spending by state and local governments doubled the overall growth of healthcare spending nationwide in 2012, illustrating the pressures such entities are under to meet obligations in that arena. Altogether, healthcare spending nationwide increased about 4 percent in 2012, but rose 8 percent among state and local governments that same year. Article

Health IT News

> The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services announced Friday that it will extend the deadline for eligible professionals to attest to Meaningful Use in the Medicare electronic health record incentive program for 2013 from Feb. 28 to 11:59 p.m. on March 31. The extension will not cover EPs attesting for the Medicaid program or Physician Quality Reporting Systems incentive program pilot. Article

And Finally... Police work isn't all that it's quacked up to be. Article