At least 280,000 Sutter Health patients could stop worrying Friday that they'd have to find a new health care provider partway through this year.

Saying that "the possibilities are boundless," President Obama on Friday announced a major biomedical research initiative, including plans to collect genetic data on one million Americans so scientists could develop drugs and treatments tailored to the characteristics of individual patients.

The Obama administration said on Wednesday that more than 7.1 million people have signed up for 2015 healthcare coverage through the federal government's insurance marketplace as of last Friday.

Medicare is giving bonuses to a majority of hospitals that it graded on quality, but many of those rewards will be wiped out by penalties the government has issued for other shortcomings, federal data show.

Pharmacists are about to finish one phase and start another in the march toward broadening their scope of practice in California to include more primary care services.

Hospitals will have to speed up changes in how well they treat Medicare patients or face lower payments under plans announced Monday by the Department of Health and Human Services.