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posted by martyb on Monday September 25 2017, @12:59PM   Printer-friendly
from the addiction-sucks dept.

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.


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  • (Score: 5, Informative) by Thexalon on Monday September 25 2017, @07:11PM

    by Thexalon (636) on Monday September 25 2017, @07:11PM (#572755)

    That said, there don't seem to be any good choices for severe chronic pain. Certainly none that are legal, and the ones that are illegal are generally illegal to even investigate.

    Absolutely.

    In places that allow research, it appears that cannibis would be a much better choice: It helps a lot with pain, it's not physically addictive, and has far fewer other negative side effects. But for reasons that have far more to do with racism and hippie-punching than science, the US government's official position is that cannibis is more dangerous than PCP [usdoj.gov].

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