The Handoff: Your Week in Endocrinology – 1/20/17

The Handoff is a weekly roundup of endocrinology and general medicine news covering various developments in subspecialties, as well as pharmaceutical industry, association, and society news.

• Questions have arisen after the controversial “pronuclear transfer” IVF technique was used in the Ukraine, allowing a couple to give birth to a baby girl. Fertility experts criticized the use of the 3-parent IVF in a patient with an unknown fertility issue.
• A recent NPR report looked into the process for orphan drugs, highlighting the pricing manipulation that often surrounds drugs needed to treat rare diseases.
• Shinya Yamanaka, MD, PhD, senior investigator in stem cell biology at the Gladstone Institute in San Francisco, director of the Kyoto University Center for iPS Cell Research and Application, and 2012 Nobel Prize winner, spoke to the New York Times about his work on the “stem cell revolution.”
• FDA Commissioner Robert Califf, MD, released a statement clarifying the organization’s recommendations regarding medical product communications. Two draft guidance statements were released, and are open to public comment until April 19, 2017.
• There’s a new boss in town: William T. Cefalu, MD has been named Chief Scientific and Medical Officer of the American Diabetes Association (ADA). Dr Cefalu previously served as associate editor for both Diabetes and Diabetes Care.
• Continued healthcare for everyone? Forbes examines a potential Affordable Care Act replacement called “Medicare for All (MFA)” that President-elect Donald Trump championed throughout the course of the 2015 GOP debates.
• This week, Endocrinology Advisor covered the 2017 updates to the ADA’s Standards of Medical Care in Diabetes. Read more about the update here.
• An Obama Administration proposal to require all federally funded science researchers to acquire patient permission prior to using their cells, blood, DNA, or tissue for research has been dropped, much to the relief of the scientific research community.
• Research recently published in the American Journal of Epidemiology suggests that the amount of exercise a woman gets is tied to telomere length. Less exercise means shorter telomere length, which increases risk of cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and cancer.