Make plans today to attend the 2015 Board Review Course set for July 21-24 at the Palmer House in Chicago, IL. Register by June 19 to received discounted room rate.

Painkillers Resist Abuse, but Experts Still Worry

 

Anthony DiTullio would pop a painkiller in his mouth but not just swallow it, as intended. He would chew it for 30 minutes, grinding through its protective coating and waxy unpleasantness, because the only pain he was treating was addiction.

 

The pill was OxyContin, a painkiller that its manufacturer, Purdue Pharma, says deters abuse by being difficult to chew or liquefy into forms that give addicts stronger highs, orally or through injection. Since adding these features to its original and widely abused OxyContin in 2010, the company has likened the pill to a virtual seatbelt to restrain the nation's epidemic of prescription drug abuse.

 

But as thousands of addicts still find ways to abuse OxyContin and similar painkillers, called abuse-deterrent formulations, some experts caution that the protections are misunderstood and could mislead both users and prescribers into thinking that the underlying medications are less addictive.

 

 

NY Times

 

Pricey Drugs Prompt AMA to Ask FDA and FTC for Help

 

CHICAGO -- Jerry D. Kennett, MD, stepped up to the mic, pulled a pill out of his pocket -- a new, extended release formulation of an irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) drug that costs $10.75 a dose -- twisted open the opaque capsule and poured out a single tablet, which was the old "formulation" that had cost just pennies when it was on the market.

 

Kennett, a member of the Council on Legislation, and a delegate for the American College of Cardiology, isn't happy with these surges. "This lowers medication compliance. Patients still have to take this new 'formulation' six times a day," he said in an interview with MedPage Today.

 

MedPage Today

 

Congress considering bills to combat opioid addiction: 4 key points

 

A recent study in The Journal of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons called opioid addiction an epidemic, and outlined the unintended consequences of over prescription of opioids for pain management. AAOS is not the only organization that feels opioids are increasingly becoming an issue. A recent MassLive.com article outlines four bills pending before Congress which aim to address this crisis.

Here are four key points:

 

1. The Protect Our Infants Act directs the Department of Health and Human Services on best practices for diagnosing and treating Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome, caused by fetal exposure to opiates.
2. The Opioid Overdose Reduction Act would protect physicians, first responders from civil liability pertaining to providing Narcan, reports MassLive.com
3. National All-Schedules Prescription Electronic Reporting reauthorization, would reinstate the program which provides state grants to those which "maintain, improve and expand their prescription drug monitoring programs," according to the report.
4. The FDA Accountability for Public Safety Act would require the FDA advisory committee to provide a recommendation on whether to approve an opioid.
    

 

Becker's

The inside story of a doctor who quit over EHR upcoding

 

Most physicians attempt to bill claims correctly and with due diligence. There are, however, those who engage more nefarious intentions that can be harmful to their practice and suck in unknowing doctors.

 

That's what happened to me and it's why I resigned from the practice - even at the cost of being sued for breaching my contract. And I'm not the only doctor who did.

 

 

Medical Practice Insider

A primer on e-prescribing controlled substances

 

Electronic prescribing of controlled substances (EPCS) has been on the rise since the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) allowed electronic prescribing processes in 2010 with the publication of the DEA regulations for EPCS. In fact, 1.67 million controlled substances were prescribed electronically in 2014, a 400 percent increase compared to 2013, according to the "2014 National Progress Report" from Surescripts. 

 

Even with this growth, only 1.4 percent of providers are enabled to use EPCS. Nonetheless, those physicians who are embracing EPCS are doing so for a variety of reasons. To start, controlled substances are becoming an integral component of patient care - accounting for a larger percent of all prescriptions each year. In addition, EPCS now can be counted as part of an organization's efforts to meet the increasingly demanding electronic prescribing thresholds associated with the government's EHR meaningful use program.

 

 

Medical Practice Insider

Are you ready for the June PQRS deadline?

 

There's an important deadline looming on June 30, 2015, the end of the reporting year for CMS' Physician Quality Reporting System.

 

Any practice with at least two doctors using the same tax ID has the option to declare by that deadline that they will report PQRS measures as a group rather than as individual physicians.

 

 

Don't believe the liberal spin. ObamaCare is sputtering

 

This month, the Supreme Court may well deliver a fatal blow to ObamaCare in King vs. Burwell, by ruling that the health insurance subsidies handed out through federal exchanges in 36 states are illegal. Many liberals seem to think that the only thing preventing the president's crowning domestic achievement from becoming a rip-roaring success is this largely specious and semantic lawsuit. But here's the thing: ObamaCare is teetering due to its own internal contradictions that have nothing to do with the lawsuit.

 

ObamaCare's supporters would like everyone to believe that with Healthcare.gov now functioning, everything is just fine and dandy. Contrary to what the conservative press (which I guess would include me) has been saying about the many problems of ObamaCare, Vox's Ezra Klein declared last September that "in the real world, it's working." In February, his fellow Voxland inhabitant Sarah Kliff rattled off eight ways in which the law had proved its critics wrong.

 

But has it? Not really.

 

The Week

 

Why the Big Five Health Insurers May Soon Be the Big Three

 

Ads for health insurance are everywhere -- in magazines, on Web sites and plastered throughout subway cars.

 

Many observers say they believe that the industry is due for a substantial round of consolidation. The Wall Street Journal recently added fuel (http://www.wsj.com/articles/humana-considers-sale-of-company-1432919621) to the speculative fire with a report that mammoth insurer Humana -- with a market capitalization of $31.5 billion -- is exploring a potential sale with the help of Goldman Sachs. Possible bidders include Aetna and Cigna.

 

The Street