The American Academy of Pediatrics isn’t recommending the nasal flu vaccine this year, after a CDC advisory committee determined it didn’t protect against specific flu strains that were most prominent in the past three years. The mist’s effectiveness among kids ages 2 to 17 was just 3 percent; the injected vaccine had a 63 percent effectiveness rate. AAP says health care providers should start offering flu vaccines no later than October to get patients immunized early in the flu season. You can read their full recommendations for this year’s flu vaccine here. 

The Department of Defense is making moves to expand mental health care and substance abuse treatment for military personnel and veterans covered under the agency’s TRICARE program. Nearly 9.4 million people are covered under TRICARE, which provides civilian health benefits to military members and their dependents. A new rule will expand coverage of substance abuse treatment to include intensive outpatient programs for addiction as well as treatment for opioid use disorder. The rule also does away with inpatient day limits for mental health care — previously, adults were only covered for 30 days in inpatient mental health facilities, while kids were covered for 45 days.

Layers of graphene get fused together to make an implanatable material. (Ajayan Group, rice university)

Flakes of graphene oxide stacked on top of each other like pancakes and welded together could be the key to building better bone implants. Scientists fused microscopic flakes of graphene oxide — an incredibly thin, strong material — to build up a porous, 3-D form of the material. That material is similar to titanium, a metal currently used in bone implants. But the scientists say layering graphene will give them more flexibility than standard titanium in quickly creating complex shapes out of molds made to replicate human bones. The team of researchers at Rice University tested the graphene by exposing it to the same kinds of stress our bones would experience every day — and found it could hold up. And collaborating scientists at the University of Texas were able to culture cells on the material to demonstrate it’d be compatible in the human body if implanted. Read about the work in Advanced Materials.

Brain-training giant Lumosity is trying to figure out where it goes next as it reels from a federal crackdown on the company’s bold health claims that its games could boost a user's IQ. Lumos Labs — the company behind the powerhouse Lumosity brand — has since significantly scaled down its TV advertising. The FTC, meanwhile, is prepping to send out rebates to 13,000 consumers who’ve requested refunds for the digital games. STAT’s Rebecca Robbins has more on how Lumosity is recalibrating here.

The CDC is doling out $2.4 million to five major metropolitan areas to help them detect and track cases of Zika-related health issues including microcephaly. Chicago, Houston, New York City, Philadelphia, and Los Angeles County are receiving funds to set up surveillance systems that can monitor for microcephaly cases in real time and get affected families connected with health resources they need. Back in early August, the CDC awarded $16.4 million to other areas to study similar adverse outcomes of Zika virus infection. 

Meanwhile, Zika response funding is the main item on the agenda as Congress returns to session today. The Obama administration is warning that it will run out of money by the end of September and, even if Congress passes a short-term funding bill to keep the government open, HHS won't have enough left over for the Zika virus response. The Senate is expected to vote again this week on the same $1.1 billion package that failed in July.

For every hour docs spend talking to patients face-to-face, they spend another two hours on administrative work and electronic health records, according to a new paper published in Annals of Internal Medicine. The study — which asked docs to keep close track of the hours they spent doing administrative work — also found that doctors spend an extra one to two hours doing that work during personal hours every evening. It’s a small survey of just 57 physicians, so it’s not clear whether physicians nationwide are tallying up similar hours. But the finding adds weight to the concern that the burden of administrative work is a significant factor contributing to physician burnout. One potential solution: providing doctors with programs or employees to help them dictate or document their notes, the study's authors suggest.