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Senate Bill Seeks To Change Painkiller Prescriptions To Seven Days Or Less
October 24, 2017
A prominent Senate Republican has filed a sweeping measure aimed at keeping patients from getting hooked on prescription painkillers. The proposal filed Monday by Senate Rules Chairwoman Lizbeth Benacquisto mirrors legislation filed this month by House Commerce Chairman Jim Boyd, R-Bradenton.
Under the bills, doctors would be limited to prescribing up to seven days’ worth of powerful narcotics and would have to consult a statewide database before ordering most pain medications.
The legislation would limit doctors to writing prescriptions for three days’ worth of controlled substances, such as the highly addictive opioid oxycodone, unless the practitioner decides a seven-day prescription is “medically necessary to treat the patient’s pain as an acute medical condition.”
Health care practitioners would also be required to consult the database, known as the prescription drug monitoring program, before writing prescriptions for controlled substances.
Under current law, doctors can access the program but are not required to use it. The measures also include some changes to the database, which pharmacists are required to use before dispensing most pain medications.
The bills proposed by Boyd and Benacquisto are intended to address a rapidly escalating opioid crisis in Florida, where 14 people die from overdoses every day, according to an interim report by the state’s medical examiners.
“This is ravaging families. It’s ravaging communities. As a human being, you cannot hear what’s going on and the pleas for help and stand on the sidelines,” Benacquisto, R-Fort Myers, said Monday. “This is the moment when we have to take strong action.”
The bills are filed for the 2018 session, which starts in January.
by The News Service of Florida
Comments
24 Responses to “Senate Bill Seeks To Change Painkiller Prescriptions To Seven Days Or Less”
This is ridiculous. If someone has exhausted all other ways to stay pain free and the only thing that helps is medication, leave them alone for Christ’s sake. There are people who have chronic pain or are terminally ill. How the hell are they expected to get up and go to their doctor every 7 days, physically and financially?? I hope every one of you who is for this stupid ass bill is struck down with some horrible, painful diagnosis. And I hope that you have a hard ass time getting the medication you need. Yeah, I sound like a horrible person, but no more horrible than the people that are already wishing this on people that need medication now.
@Retired; Yes it will, but to what tangible benefit ? To get half the pills off the street and burden the other half so much that they simply can’t jump through all the hoops ? Way to go. Sounds like real positive progress there. And what do you suppose the addicts will do when half the street pills are gone ? Same thing they did when the pill mills got closed; turn to heroin and meth. It exploded since then and will doubly with this bill. Then again, I feel as if they may be trying to purposefully destroy our nation completely. They know what will happen. Everything is backwards now. Up is down, left is right. Conservative or liberal matters not. When it comes to destruction, their on the same page. Fifteen years ago, I’d call myself a conspiracy nut. There’s too much crap from all sides.
I am so tired of our government trying to control everything we do. People who are hooked on pain meds knew they were getting hooked and continued to take more. They didn’t talk to their doctors and let them know they were having a problem, which they should have done. So now the people who try to do the right thing will be the ones who suffer. People who say this is a good thing the government is trying to do have never truly been in real pain. If you get in enough pain you will do anything to stop it. I think you will find people turning to alcohol and even in some cases suicide to stop their pain. But the government doesn’t care about us, the old and poor. In the eyes of the government we are expendable. Sad but true.
This is rediculous! Follow the money trai! That will tell you why goverment wants to control pain medicine. You never hear goverment talking about concern over people taking illegal drugs or stopping drug dealers. I have taken many injections in my back ,physical therapy, tens units, surgery and spent thousands of dollars on surgery and tests. Done everything thing I have been asked to do by doctors. Unfortunately, the surgery, physical therapy and many many injections did not work. I have been told I just have to accept the pain I have to live with daily. The goverment doesnt care if we are in pain. Its all about the money. I had people in my family that died from cancer. Are they going to make a cancer patient go to dr every 3-7 days. Maybe one day the very people pushing for this bill will find out what it’s really feels like to live in pain daily.
The same argument holds with this as does guns. You cannot deny everyone guns because others misuse them and you should not deny chronic pain sufferers the proper medication for the same reasons. You will enrich the drug cartels, you will cause massive unnecessary pain and suffering. Simply put, you cannot make so many people suffer because of others inability to obey laws. You did this with cold medicine and it has not reduced the meth one bit.
Please tellme this is not true !
I am 64 yearold with a dna mutation that causes severe bone and joint pain.Obviously there is no cure because it is a mutation ( heriditary )on the dna strand.
28 percent of the caucasion population of European desent carries this mutation.
It is caused hemachromatosis or iron overload.
I was diagnosed in 2008.
I have tried unsuccessfully over the past years to find an alternative to pain medication.
Unfortunatly this mutation causes all kinds of other maladys including chirrossis of the liver ( which I have) diabetes , heart problems , and many others.
The iron absorbed through foods that are ingested store in the organs …any organ..we do not metabolize iron ,or rid excess of iron from our bodies.
Thus iron being a heavy metal stored in joints and tissues and organs ,causes severe pain.
Opiods are the only thing that keeps me going, able to live a happy life.
I have nnever abused my medication and do not mix with any other medications or alcohol….I do not drink.at all. The only tratment …sndard treatment for this condition is bloodletting or phlebotomy on a frequent, regular badis to rid the body of excess iron.
Ridding of iron does not however get rid of damage done to tissue ,joints and organs..
Please reconsider this bill and collect more data from citizens like me and others who desperatly nneed pain medications for medically approved ,real conditions . Thank you. !
Medical problems are not all cut with the same cookie cutter. I am so tired of politicians making the choices that doctors should make.
So, now you’re going to make me go to the doctor (at $50 a pop) every 7 days to get my pain meds. THIS IS NONSENSE!!!!! I can’t afford to go to the doctor every 7 days and the people who really need pain meds to control their pain are going to suffer! OUR CONGRESS ACTUALLY THINKS THIS WILL STOP OVER DOSES. HAHAHA!!! You’re just making it harder for the people that are in real pain.
I’m in pain management for an back issues that are too far gone no doctor so far will attempt surgery my insurance covers one pain script per month and we are barely making it financially I have 3 sons whom always want daddy doing something…what I supposed to tell them….sorry boys daddy gotta lay around and cry next 3 weeks till I can get drugs to spend time with you…hmmm… seriously some people are on this medicine for good reason and most that overdose are just dope heads that will just get high on next drug regardless so stop trying to punish medical world…and unfortunately let the irresponsible dopers weed themselves out they will either learn hard way or die trying but there is no true way to stop people from doing bad stuff other then the attempt to educate….period
Another attempt by the Govt to run Medicine,what happens to all the folks who depend on these Meds to survive each day due to Chronic pain etc etc,maybe they should worry about Illegal drugs,Gangs and Guns not prescription Meds!
Yeah right! Anyone who thinks the Dr will say no to another 7 day prescription is crazy! All this will do is put more people on the roads that need to stay home to begin with.
As someone who has known many friends and family struggle with Dr prescribed opioid addiction I am neutral to this law. From the struggles my close friends and family went through the hardest thing for them appears to be just finding opiate treatment that does not require a 2nd mortgage or major loan to get. Lots off people can not afford the absurd cost to just break the cycle even if they wanted to. it boils down to poor people vs rich people when it comes to treatment or insurance for treatment from what I have seen. Plenty of studies and factual evidence can be obtained to verify this, as I have seen.
What it will do is put a damper on those who sell their pain medication.
Really what happened to our rights what about the poor people or elderly people or the people who don’t have the transportation to go back and forth plus not concerned about our already hard working pharmacy this gives them double work..everyone has a right to be pain free everyone needs to go and protest.
Medical pot was passed by the voters. It has clear scientific documentation as to its pain reduction qualities especially with cancer patients. Do you think the legislators would be fast tracking the implementation of alternative pain relief other than opiods which are poison. Nope. Some mentally challenged person thinks making it more difficult for sick people to get pain relief will magically stop opiod addiction. It will not. There is one truth which will never change. Legislators look for easy answers and who is paying the most to their campaign fund. The alcohol and restaurant lobbying groups have fought legal medical pot in every state while people suffer unnecessarily. Stop corrupt practices and engage brains.
I do not personally have a need for pain meds, but I know people who do and I worry about their quality of life if this bill passes. I would encourage people to call or write your Senators and Representatives, tell them your stories and urge them not to vote for this bill.
This is a very controversial issue that the DRUG CZAR and SOME doctors have created.
*I for one have an ex husband who is (useless) hooked on pain pills. i watched him for many years in pain.However, he was able to go hunting and fishing or whatever he wanted to do when HE wanted to do it.
*Then I watch a girl at work, who supposedly has a bad back, she has had surgery and goes for Chiropractic Services, complains constantly but still comes to work, rides a motorcycle with her husband,plays with her big, wild, crazy dogs, etc…
*Then there is a lady I know who was injured (slipped and fell) on the job – she is a zombie she cannot make it to family gathering, grand kids birthday parties, nothing because of the pain killers.
I’m sorry if I couldn’t have surgery that would fix it I think I would leave some activities along to be able to do others, especially with my grand kids.
I THINK THEY NEED TO BE LIMITED and if I needed them bad enough i’d go to the Dr. 4 times a month, I’d have that dreaded surgery.
I take medication daily for different things, HBP, Hormones, even a mood stabilizer but I am not addicted. I don’t get them, sell them and use the money for other things as some DO instead of working. I’m thankful for a job and Tylenol.
Seems to me that all needs to happen is the Doctors to access the data biases that are available to see what the patient’s medication they now have and decide that they have enough rather than being so trigger happy just to write a prescription (Kickback). Our lawmakers are like the writers of Hollywood they have ran out of good stuff to write about. just saying
And what happens to all the poor, chronically ill?
4 co-pays a month, more trips to the doctors office and pharmacy for people that already have transportation problems.
More harassment of doctors like those over in Jay a few years ago.
The government needs to focus on real problems; why not wait until they can enforce the laws against illegal drugs that they already have??
Numberwise, there’s a lot more alcohol abuse than this so-called opioids-epidemic that they want to fight now.
Didn’t we go through this already in the 1920s with prohibition?
This is a bad idea how in the world, would our insurance deal with billing ,I am a cancer patient, and bad back. They need to consider other this crazy ideal.
It won’t do any good to change this. People are already hooked on numerous drugs and illegal drugs including those they can manufacture and buy from traffickers. . You’re only taking away the healing process from a patient that truly needs the medication for an extended period of time. My friend for one, he had his leg amputated due to diabetes. Do you think 7 days of painkillers was enough after his surgery. ABSOLUTELY NOT ! All you lawmakers need to step into our shoes sometimes and see what it would take. You don’t have any idea what it feels like to be in pain 24/7. Take your strong action out the window and leave this alone.
I wonder how this will effect people like me who is in pain management treatment and have been for decades now. Only the strongest meds work for me even though for me only about a little. There is nothing out there right now in the medical field to help me. I haven’t tried marijuana yet. But the state is doing their best to slow roll it and I don’t know if I can afford it.
This is a terrible idea. This will do nothing to alleviate or stop the people illegally abusing these drugs. What it will do is put a new increased financial burden on the people under their doctors care that require pain management prescriptions.
I don’t think this is a good idea. I think the record are showing they just get heroin instead and law abiding people who benefit and have a better quality of life by taking prescription meds correctly are penalized. Knee jerk reaction, well intended but not a good bill.