Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
When Drugs Are Everywhere, The Daily Struggle To Stay Clean Can Be A Herculean Effort
The Washington Post: The Lonely Road Of Staying Clean
Jessica Kilpatrick was in the middle of a 10-hour shift at Burger King when she checked her phone messages. Right away she knew. It was the canned voice of the community corrections office ordering her in for a random drug test. Jessica put her headset back on and tried to stay calm. She looked into a mirror. She was hot and greasy and smelled like a Croissan’wich, but her eyes were clear and her mind was straight, unglazed by opioid painkillers. She had not missed a single day of work in 11 months. Above: Jessica Kilpatrick and Jeremy Horton have tried to get their lives in order after years of drug abuse. But with Jeremy now having to serve a prison sentence, Jessica must enter a new chapter while fighting her addiction to painkillers. “Have a blessed one,” a customer shouted from the drive-through, and Jessica, who was 33, hollered back in her raspy twang, “You do the same.” She had learned in recovery to focus on the positive and not let the old voices get too loud, so on the drive to the courthouse later she thought of the calendar she kept at home on her nightstand. For every day she stayed clean, she marked another X. (Hull, 6/11)
The New York Times: An E.R. Kicks The Habit Of Opioids For Pain
Since Jan. 4, St. Joseph’s Regional Medical Center’s emergency department, one of the country’s busiest, has been using opioids only as a last resort. For patients with common types of acute pain — migraines, kidney stones, sciatica, fractures — doctors first try alternative regimens that include nonnarcotic infusions and injections, ultrasound guided nerve blocks, laughing gas, even “energy healing” and a wandering harpist. Scattered E.R.s around the country have been working to reduce opioids as a first-line treatment, but St. Joe’s, as it is known locally, has taken the efforts to a new level. (Hoffman, 6/10)
The New York Times: Drug Maker’s Former Employees Accused Of Shady Dealings With Doctors
Jonathan Roper, once a sales manager at Insys Therapeutics, a small pharmaceutical company, had a problem. The end of the quarter was near, and for the first time, Insys was in danger of missing sales goals for its only product, a spray called Subsys that contains the powerful painkiller fentanyl. So Mr. Roper sent out a blistering email to his staff members at the time, in March 2014, urging them to make a final push. “There is no excuse for any of your docs to not take care of you at this crucial time of the quarter,” he wrote. It’s time, he said, for the top-prescribing doctors “to give back for all of the hard work, long days and late nights you have spoiled them with.” Mr. Roper and a former sales representative, Fernando Serrano, were arrested on Thursday on federal anti-kickback charges. (Thomas, 6/10)
NPR: Investors See Big Opportunities In Opioid Addiction Treatment
The first time Ray Tamasi got hit up by an investor, it was kind of out of the blue. "This guy called me up," says Tamasi, president of Gosnold on Cape Cod, an addiction treatment center with seven sites in Massachusetts. "The guy" represented a group of investors; Tamasi declines to say whom. But they were looking to buy addiction treatment centers like Gosnold. "He had checked around and learned that we were one of the more reputable programs. We had a good reputations in the community — nice array of services," Tamasi recalls. "He wanted to know if we were interested in becoming part of his company." (Kodjak, 6/10)
Meanwhile, in other news on the opioid epidemic —
The New York Times: Prescription Drug Abuse Among Older Adults Is Harder To Detect
Drug addiction is not restricted to the young. Donna Weber, now 53, turned to painkillers after undergoing simple surgery. Then a long, tortured path to divorce made her anxious and depressed. Soon, she found herself on a candy-colored pill roller coaster. Unlike street drugs, the pharmaceutical pills were easy to obtain legally. She got them from emergency rooms, dentists, psychiatrists, even plastic surgeons. “I went to doctors with exaggerated truths,” explained Ms. Weber, who once had four doctors. “I said I hurt more and more.” (Gustke, 6/10)
The Baltimore Sun: Health Officials Try Accommodating Rather Than Punishing Heroin Addicts
...(As) early as next year, Baltimore's health commissioner, Dr. Leana Wen, hopes to open a "stabilization" center where addicts can be taken to sober up and get referrals to treatment and other services. The addicts — many of whom now end up in hospital emergency rooms or jail — also would receive food, clothing and a shower. (Marbella and Cohn, 6/11)
Modern Healthcare: AMA Set On Ending Barriers To Reimbursement For Painkiller Alternatives
As physicians face increased scrutiny over prescribing painkillers, the nation's largest medical group meets this week with delegates resolved to eliminate barriers to alternative treatments. (Johnson 6,11)
The Associated Press: County Asks Feds For Drug Treatment-Bed Waiver
Ohio’s largest county is asking the federal government to waive rules that would make more publicly funded beds available for long-term drug treatment as it battles a growing epidemic of heroin and fentanyl abuse that has killed 200 people so far this year. (Gillispie, 6/13)
