What the hell, Ohio?
Sep. 4th, 2013 11:29 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
seawaspUPDATE: She has clarified that this is apparently not the law per se, but the interpretation/ruling of the Medical Board.
My LJ friend![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
denelian is one of several that I know who have chronic pain from some condition or another. Often these people are enduring pain on a *regular* basis that most of us only see for very short periods of time and that DOESN'T GO AWAY.
So now, per a post by denelian, Ohio has decided that ONLY cancer patients should have access to strong pain medications (i.e., Narcotics and certain others).
This is just plain insane. They're going to punish tens of thousands, perhaps more, for the fact that some other people like to take drugs for a high -- and it will have *zero* effect on the drug use (take a look at the similar, less painful but much broader, restrictions on pseudoephedrine; years after it was removed from OTC status, NO effect on the illegal meth use).
I don't live in Ohio, but this is the kind of thing that needs to be stopped dead, right now.
My LJ friend
denelian is one of several that I know who have chronic pain from some condition or another. Often these people are enduring pain on a *regular* basis that most of us only see for very short periods of time and that DOESN'T GO AWAY.So now, per a post by denelian, Ohio has decided that ONLY cancer patients should have access to strong pain medications (i.e., Narcotics and certain others).
This is just plain insane. They're going to punish tens of thousands, perhaps more, for the fact that some other people like to take drugs for a high -- and it will have *zero* effect on the drug use (take a look at the similar, less painful but much broader, restrictions on pseudoephedrine; years after it was removed from OTC status, NO effect on the illegal meth use).
I don't live in Ohio, but this is the kind of thing that needs to be stopped dead, right now.
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no subject
Date: 2013-09-04 03:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-09-04 04:12 pm (UTC)-- Steve hates how this sort of thing gets politicised. Medicine is medicine and doesn't (and shouldn't) give a rat's ass about ideology.
no subject
Date: 2013-09-04 06:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-09-04 06:28 pm (UTC)I get my Good Drugs from the VAMC, and I do not have cancer, but I am a 100% disabled veteran, and there are days when the Pain is not our friend.
no subject
Date: 2013-09-04 09:41 pm (UTC)http://codes.ohio.gov/oac/4731-21
At a quick skim the following jump out:
(G) "Intractable pain" means a state of pain that is determined, after reasonable medical efforts have been made to relieve the pain or cure its cause, to have a cause for which no treatment or cure is possible or for which none has been found. "Intractable pain" does not include pain experienced by a patient with a terminal condition. "Intractable pain" does not include the treatment of pain associated with a progressive disease that, in the normal course of progression, may reasonably be expected to result in a terminal condition.
(L) "Protracted basis" means for a period in excess of twelve continuous weeks.
(A) When utilizing any prescription drug for the treatment of intractable pain on a protracted basis or when managing intractable pain with prescription drugs in amounts or combinations that may not be appropriate when treating other medical conditions, a practitioner shall comply with accepted and prevailing standards of care which shall include, but not be limited to, the following:
(lots of intrusive stuff that takes more than a quick skim)
no subject
Date: 2013-09-05 12:58 am (UTC)