I-Team: Doctors to tell lawmakers of patients left suffering because of opioid crackdown

https://www.lasvegasnow.com/news/local-news/i-team-doctors-to-tell-lawmakers-of-patients-left-suffering-because-of-opioid-crackdown/1802135610

LAS VEGAS – Despite their influence and stature, Nevada physicians are not overtly political, but it looks like doctors are planning to make their presence known at the Nevada Legislature this year.

Monday is designated as doctor day at the legislature, where physicians and medical organizations hope to make an impression on lawmakers.

One issue at the top of their list of concerns is the regulation of pain management, which doctors say has become burdensome for them and deadly for their patients.

Hours after being released from a month-long hospital stay, Theresa Hatter told the I-Team about the moment she was first diagnosed with arachnoiditis.

“I couldn’t see. It was the worst pain I ever had. If you were saying pain on a scale of 1 to 10, I was at a 15,” Hatter said.

For 16 years, she was a model  patient in pain management. Opioid medication was her only relief. Then out of the blue, her doctor told her goodbye and good luck.

Reporter George Knapp: “With pain medication you had a life?”

Theresa Hatter: “I had a life.”

Reporter George Knapp: “And now you don’t?”

Theresa Hatter: “I’m in bed.”

In the 90s, Tracy Davis was shot in the back. The bullet ripped through his stomach and lung and is still inside, until recently his insurance paid for pain medication. But then the culinary union plan ordered his doctor to cut the meds in half.

Reporter George Knapp: “Someone decided you don’t need it?”

Tracy Davis: “Yes. They never even ran a test on me.”

Across the country, the great opioid crackdown continues. Doctors have been pressured into cutting or eliminating pain medications against their own medical judgements. Insurance companies have cut or eliminated coverage. Pharmacy chains have imposed their own — often severe — limitations or requirements.

Doctors like Maurice Gregory are squeezed by regulators, lawmakers, insurance executives, and pharmacists, none of whom have examined the actual patients.

“This anti-opiate has gotten to the extreme of sacrificing people’s lives,” said Dr Maurice Gregory, Las Vegas physician. “We are already sacrificing people’s quality of life.”

Opioid prescriptions are now at their lowest point in 15 years, but overdose deaths are at their highest in that same time. Cutting medications for legitimate pain patients has had no effect on addicts’ overdosing.

What it has done is to create suffering for millions of people whose mistake was they got sick or injured and are now expected to live the rest of their lives in pain.

“You can live 30, 40, 50 years with these diseases. The only thing you can do for them is control the pain. There’s no reason, why would we not want to do that,” said Terry Murphy, public policy consultant. “And yet we are taking medication away from them and forcing them to live in torture in America in 2019. Why?”

Murphy has had multiple surgeries and was a pain patient herself. Now, she is helping Nevada doctors to mobilize. Murphy and others including medical associations are gearing up to make their presence known at the Nevada Legislature. Among the goals is to get a handle on changes imposed two years ago which give pharmacists the ability to deny or alter prescriptions or to make excessive demands for patient information or new tests.

“These decisions need to be made between a doctor and a patient and what is happening is between a doctor, a pharmacy benefit manager, a pharmacist, an insurer, and the patient gets lost in that equation and the doctor who really wants to help the patient is frustrated,” Murphy said.

While doctors here feel under the gun, Murphy says Nevada is already less draconian than some states. She thinks that pending legislation could make Nevada into a model for the rest of the country, with appropriate safeguards, but also something missing from the system — compassion. 

It sounds like from this report the Nevada state legislature has turned the Medical Licensing Board into a PAPER TIGER. The legislature has apparently granted about anyone that has something to do with the healthcare system in Nevada the legal right to practice medicine.  Don’t have to have a medical degree, don’t have to do a in person physical exam/evaluation… just create some personal or corporate “cookie cutter policies” that can be applied to EVERYONE.

I guess that the DEA could care less that controlled meds are being started, changed, stopped without the person – or corporation – doing it has done a in person exam/evaluation – as required by the Controlled Substance Act 1970.

The vast majority of the people who have a legal medical necessity for controlled meds are covered by the Americans with Disability Act.. so where are the civil rights attorneys or organizations. Nevada has 3 + million people so average stats would suggest that there are abt 300,000 intractable chronic pain pts in the state and another 700,000 or so dealing with some sort of chronic pain and at least on occasions have the need to have a opiate to get their pain under control.

Are these legislators believing the FACTOIDS that are being thrown around they are meaningful ?  Are these FACTOIDS drowning out the REAL FACTS that have no relationship to those FACTOIDS ?

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https://videoyourpain.com/

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NJ dealer caught with 83 bricks of heroin gets 6 months of rehab, no prison

http://nj1015.com/nj-dealer-caught-with-83-bricks-of-heroin-gets-6-months-of-rehab-no-prison

TOMS RIVER — An admitted drug dealer who was caught with about 4,150 doses of heroin worth $25,000 was sentenced to just six months of rehab and five years of probation.

Gary Fox, 30, of Toms River, who has a criminal record that includes previous drug convictions, avoided prison by being accepted by Drug Court and pleading guilty to two counts of third-degree possession with intent to distribute and a count of possession.

Fox, however, does face an alternate prison sentence of 10 years in prison with 3 1/2 years of parole ineligibility if he fails to complete the Drug Court program, according to a spokesman for the Ocean County Prosecutor’s Office, who added Wednesday that the sentence was not a result of a plea deal with prosecutors.

The Drug Courts, part of Gov. Chris Christie’s reform efforts in the wake of a massive heroin addiction epidemic gripping the state, are meant to provide drug users with rehabilitation instead of placing them behind bars. Drug Courts, however, are not for violent or hardened criminals.

The courts found Fox eligible for the program and he began rehab in November, remaining in custody until his guilty plea in January, prosecutors said. Court records show he spent 168 days in county jail.

Toms River police arrested Fox in May, saying he had 80 wax folds of heroin and $740 in cash. A search of his storage unit found an additional 83 bricks of heroin, which amounted to 4,150 doses and a cash value of close to $25,000, police said at the time.

A month later, police at his Old Street home found another 40 wax folds of heroin, more than 1.5 pounds of marijuana, $2,000 in cash, prescription medications, a scale and packaging materials.

Fox was initially charged with possession of heroin, possession of heroin with intent to distribute, possession of over 50 grams of marijuana, possession of marijuana with intent to distribute, possession of Alprazolam and Suboxone, and possession of drug paraphernalia.

He plead guilty to two counts of third-degree possession with intent to distribute and one count of possession.

Police on Tuesday said they could not provide more details about the investigation.

This is not the first time Fox has been sentenced to rehab as a result of drug charges.

In 2009, he received the same sentence from a different judge in Ocean County for arrests in 2006 and 2007 on charges of possession of cocaine and Percocet.

Fox was represented by the Public Defender’s Office.

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Thank you to all that responded. I appreciate the advice .
The pharmacy we use is not a mom and pop but a large independent one. The letter that was given by the pharmacist to my friend mentioned not only the DEA but also pharmacy wholesalers not supplying to pharmacies with patients receiving opioids above the 90 mme. I have not heard of this component to the issues patients are facing. See the attached portion of the letter he was handed.
He has been with this pharmacy for close to 10 years. They have always been helpful and understanding.
I am just confused as to what the wholesalers role is in denying medications??
Has anyone else heard of this?

Apparently in Georgia the HIPAA covered pt medication information is made available to the Pharmacy board, DEA and numerous pharmacy wholesalers do “data mining” on this database.  Also apparently some entity in Georgia have decided that the CDC opiate dosing guidelines as “standard of care” and “best practices”. The above letter was handed to a pt when the pt’s opiate pain management meds were DENIED…

Someone needs to read the law that established the PMP in Georgia and see if this sort of data mining is authorized by that law… and if so then someone needs to hire a law firm because that may make it in conflict with the Americans with Disability Act and if there is a complimentary state ADA law as well.

The vast majority of pts being prescribed controlled meds… are dealing with subjective diseases… most of which would make these pts covered entities under the ADA law.

So does a state have the legal authority to pass a law that is in conflict with the ADA and does that make the state law – UNCONSTITUTIONAL. ?

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Sheriff was BURIED LAST WEEK  https://www.wpsdlocal6.com/2019/02/19/graves-county-sheriff-dewayne-redmon-honored-at-funeral/

https://www.newsweek.com/kentucky-sheriff-accused-raiding-drug-drop-box-his-own-personal-use-re-1205504

A Kentucky sheriff accused of stealing drugs from a drop box for his own personal use won re-election by a landslide despite the charges pending against him and a public letter from his deputies stating that he has an addiction.

Dewayne Redmon is once again Graves County sheriff after securing 47.2 percent of the vote in the election held on Tuesday. He faced off against six write-in candidates, with second place Jason Clark picking up 26.2 percent and third place Davant Ramage on 18.2 percent.  

Redmon was indicted by a grand jury in August on two counts, reported WKMS. One count was of first degree possession of a controlled substance, a felony, and the second of official misconduct, a misdemeanour.

In September, he pleaded not guilty to the charges and is due back in court Wednesday—the day after his re-election.

The sheriff is accused of taking hydrocodone from a drug drop box for his own use instead of destroying the prescription medication as he was supposed to do. Hydrocodone is an opioid derived from codeine.

“I appreciate the confidence that the voters have once again put in me,” Redmon said after his election, reported The Mayfield Messenger. On the issue of his indictment, Redmon said: “We’ll just wait until the court system plays out to see how it goes any further.”

https://www.newsweek.com/kentucky-sheriff-accused-raiding-drug-drop-box-his-own-personal-use-re-1205504

Sheriff Dewayne Redmon of Graves County, Kentucky, was re-elected despite the drugs charges against him. Graves County Sheriff’s Office

A letter co-signed by a number of deputies in the Graves County Sheriff’s Office was sent out to the media in October accusing Redmon of having an addiction and pledging to support him and his family in overcoming it.

It said Captain Jeremy Prince spotted Redmon with a pill bottle that had “pain” written across the top of it after the sheriff had taken control of responsibility for the drug drop boxes.

Empty pill bottles with other people’s names on them were allegedly discovered in Redmon’s vehicle and the matter reported to Kentucky State Police, which opened an investigation.

“Sheriff Redmon admitted to stealing pain medication from the Sheriff’s Office drug drop box numerous times,” the letter states, according to a copy published by WPSD. “Sheriff Redmon was also offered treatment for his drug addiction, but he stated that he did not need any help because he did not have a problem.

“Once a Sheriff, Deputy Sheriff, Police Officer, State Trooper or other law enforcement officer has violated their code of ethics and their oath, their ability to do their job has been compromised… Once a person commits crimes, no matter the reason, they can no longer be respected and trusted in a law enforcement role.”  

In October, Redmon’s attorney Bryan Wilson responded to the letter, accusing the sheriff’s department of a “blatant attempt to try Sheriff Redmon through the media and to influence the court of public opinion.”

Wilson told WPSD: “The fact that Election Day is drawing near should not be lost on anyone. Make no mistake, this letter was posted for political gain without consideration to the ramifications its contents would have on the pending criminal case.”

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Just picked up my mom from the hospital. She had her appendix out, gallbladder out and a large cancerous mass in her colon removed. AND GUESS WHAT?! They sent her home with no pain medication. She is to take Tylenol if she has pain! I’m so angry!!! Right now she still has iv pain meds in her, but I’m sure she will be in a lot of pain once that wears off. What is wrong with these doctors and our medical system? I guess they think she will either overdose or become addicted if they give her prescription pain medications. If she is in agonizing pain, I will not let them treat my mother like this. I just don’t understand in what world that this is okay. This is inhuman treatment!!! Shame on the Wilkes-Barre General Hospital! Dr. Kline states that, we need to start calling out the people and places that treat patients with gross negligence. We need to stop with the silence. It’s just allowing these entities to continue treating patients in this way. I will no longer be silent!!!

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