Minnesota has a new proposal for how health care providers should prescribe opioids, crafted to reduce dependency on the powerful narcotics.
Lt. Gov. Tina Smith announced the new recommendations Friday with health care providers and other state leaders at Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis. The draft guidelines were created by a group of doctors and community leaders, and the state will accept public input on them until the end of December.
“These new guidelines build on the important steps we have taken in Minnesota to address the opioid epidemic. But we cannot expect to make meaningful progress without a significant and sustained investment in prevention, treatment, and recovery,” Smith said in a statement.
Last year, 395 Minnesotans died from opioid overdoses, with about half of those deaths due to prescription drugs like Oxycontin, according to the latest state data. That’s an 18 percent increase in fatal opioid overdoses since 2015.
The new guidelines ask health care providers to limit prescriptions to the lowest effective dose of opioids for patients with acute pain. Only three days’ worth of the painkillers should be distributed at once and for no more than seven days total.
Patients with acute pain should be monitored closely, the guidelines say. Prescribers should assess patients’ risk factors for dependence.
The long-term use of opioids to manage chronic pain is discouraged under the new guidelines. Patients using opioids for chronic pain should be monitored closely with regular face-to-face visits with their health care provider.
“For too long Minnesota’s health care community, like that of the rest of the nation, has not addressed the problem of pain management in a comprehensive manner but has relied on expedient and largely ineffective solutions such as pills, procedures and quick visits,” said Dr. Chris Johnson, chair of the Opioid Prescribing Work Group. Johnson added that opioids play an important role in pain management but carry serious risks.
The Opioid Prescribing Work Group was created through bipartisan legislation passed in 2015.
State officials want all providers to follow the new guidelines. Those who prescribe an abundance of opioids and participate in state medical assistance or MinnesotaCare will have to participate in a program to meet the new guidelines.
State leaders also noted Minnesota received a $1.4 million federal grant this week to combat the distribution of heroin and other illegal opioids.
A group of Minnesota county attorneys announced Thursday they planned lawsuits against opioid manufacturers and distributors. The group alleged that doctors were misled to believe the drugs were not addictive and were a safe way to manage pain.
The lawsuits are part of a string of legal actions across the nation to try to improve the oversight of opioid prescriptions and seeking financial damages to address addiction in what is now considered a public health crisis.
In response to news of the lawsuit, John Parker of the Healthcare Distribution Alliance said the industry group was taking steps to address the opioid crisis but refused to be “scapegoats.”
“We don’t make medicines, market medicines, prescribe medicines, or dispense them to consumers,” Parker said in a statement. “Given our role, the idea that distributors are solely responsible for the number of opioid prescriptions written defies common sense and lacks understanding of how the pharmaceutical supply chain actually works and how it is regulated.”