Health Highlights: July 8, 2008

The AMA ads say senators who failed to reverse the cuts to doctors are aiding "powerful insurance companies at the expense of Medicare patients' access to doctors."

The Bush administration has ordered a delay in processing new Medicare claims, hoping that a compromise can be reached. Senate Democrats say they're planning to force another vote on the matter this week, the newspaper said.

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Kennedy Tired But Doing Well During Cancer Therapy

Aside from a bout with fatigue, Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) is doing well at the midpoint of his six week's of cancer therapy, his wife said in an e-mail to friends and supporters obtained Monday by the Associated Press.

Vicki Kennedy said the senator is exercising in the morning before heading from his Cape Code home to Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston each day for radiation and chemotherapy.

Sen. Kennedy suffered a seizure May 17 at his home and was subsequently diagnosed with a malignant glioma, an especially lethal type of brain tumor. He had surgery June 2 at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C., and has since been treated in Boston.

"The only side effect [of his cancer therapy] is fatigue, and that word has never been in Teddy's vocabulary before," Vicki Kennedy said in the e-mail. "He is tackling cancer with his trademark grit and determination, and he is doing everything he needs to do to regain his strength and health."