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CVS is finally trying to do something about the opioid epidemic:
Drug-store chain CVS Health announced Thursday that it will limit opioid prescriptions in an effort to combat the epidemic that accounted for 64,000 overdose deaths last year alone.
Amid pressure on pharmacists, doctors, insurers and drug companies to take action, CVS also said it would boost funding for addiction programs, counseling and safe disposal of opioids.
[...] The company's prescription drug management division, CVS Caremark, which provides medications to nearly 90 million people, said it would use its sweeping influence to limit initial opioid prescriptions to seven-day supplies for new patients facing acute ailments.
It will instruct pharmacists to contact doctors when they encounter prescriptions that appear to offer more medication than would be deemed necessary for a patient's recovery. The doctor would be asked to revise it. Pharmacists already reach out to physicians for other reasons, such as when they prescribe medications that aren't covered by a patient's insurance plan.
The plan also involves capping daily dosages and initially requiring patients to get versions of the medications that dispense pain relief for a short period instead of a longer duration.
[...] "The whole effort here is to try to reduce the number of people who are going to end up with some sort of opioid addiction problem," CVS Chief Medical Officer Troyen Brennan said in an interview.
It appears this initiative is limited to initial filling of prescriptions — there is no mention of changes in the handling of refills.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 25 2017, @03:20PM (2 children)
Why are they calling the Doctor if they suspect inappropriate/over prescription or false prescription? why not the local Medical association so that they can investigate the DOCTOR all this does is make life difficult for patients and will likely do nothing about the problem, the DOCTORS and the Drug companies are the responsible ones the pharmacies are just the distribution network they can detect problems in the system but they don't have the expertise or authority to investigate Medical associations, regulators do and huge drug companies can be forced to stop being pushers
The only reason to have CVS do this is to obscure who is actually in positions of responsibility further confuse the problem and make sure nothing is done and no one that is actually responsible is ever held to account.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Monday September 25 2017, @03:53PM
Good questions.
You may have some answers in Opioids and the Treatment of Chronic Pain: Controversies, Current Status, and Future Directions [nih.gov]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Monday September 25 2017, @04:45PM
There seems to be a misconception here. If your pharmacist calls your doctor, he is going to do so WHILE YOU ARE STANDING THERE WAITING. It has happened to me. He dials, a receptionist answers, the pharmacist identifies himself, and asks to speak to the doctor. Doctor gets on the line, and they discuss anything from "Is the generic brand alright for this patient?" to "This dosage looks wrong, shouldn't it be higher/lower?" on to "Are you aware that the patient has this condition and/or takes these other meds?"
Time consumption is measured in many seconds, to a few minutes. The phone call doesn't delay you by hours. Every time I've been present when the pharmacist called the doctor, the purpose was either to save money, or to clarify things the doctor MAY NOT have been aware of. Usually, I'm grateful that the pharmacist went to the trouble of calling the doctor, or if not grateful, then certainly not resentful.
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