[Vision2020] Pain Pills Add Cost and Delays to Job Injuries

Art Deco art.deco.studios at gmail.com
Mon Jun 4 05:55:55 PDT 2012


As has been said many times:  Big money, the pharmaceutical industry, the
beverage industry, and the hospitality industry, directly or indirectly
supply a huge amount of the money used to campaign against marijuana as a a
pain medication and as a recreational substance.

Narcotics side effects and addiction is preferable to the relatively low
adverse impacts of marijuana usage?

Despite a great deal of research on the effects of marijuana, opponents of
its medical and/or recreational use strive to keep the public and
especially legislators steeped in the ignorance of the *Reefer Madness* era.

This is just another example of money buying politicians to the egregious
detriment of the general population.

w.

On Sun, Jun 3, 2012 at 10:16 PM, Moscow Cares <moscowcares at moscow.com>wrote:

> Let me see if I have this right . . .
>
> Physicians are administering morphine, an extremely addictive drug, to
> elderly patients as a pain killer.  Yet, these same patients are denied
> access to medical marijuana because . . . er . . . uh . . . what was the
> reason again?  Oh, that's right.  It's illegal.  JEEEESH!
>
> Seeya round town, Moscow.
>
> Tom Hansen
> Moscow, Idaho
>
> "If not us, who?
> If not now, when?"
>
> - Unknown
>
>
>
> On Jun 3, 2012, at 20:57, lfalen <lfalen at turbonet.com> wrote:
>
> > Thanks Wayne.
> > This basally agrees with an article in the June 2012 issue of "Focus on
> Healthy Aging" on Options for relieving chronic Pain.
> > It says that "Acetaminophen is the first line line approach for mild
> pain and is usually taken over the long term without problems. Older adults
> are more susceptible to possible side effects like gastrointestinal
> bleeding and a higher risk of cardiac events. Because of this medications
> such as morphine and oxycodone are now often recommended as first line
> medications for older adults with moderate to severe pain. But they need to
> managed carefully, due opiate side effects."
> >
> > Roger
> > -----Original message-----
> > From: Art Deco art.deco.studios at gmail.com
> > Date: Sun, 03 Jun 2012 12:44:19 -0700
> > To: vision2020 at moscow.com
> > Subject: [Vision2020] Pain Pills Add Cost and Delays to Job Injuries
> >
> >> [image: The New York Times] <http://www.nytimes.com/>
> >>
> >> <
> http://www.nytimes.com/adx/bin/adx_click.html?type=goto&opzn&page=www.nytimes.com/printer-friendly&pos=Position1&sn2=336c557e/4f3dd5d2&sn1=583f0e00/12f0b84f&camp=FSL2012_ArticleTools_120x60_1787507c_nyt5&ad=RubySparks_Apr20_120x60_noText&goto=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Efoxsearchlight%2Ecom%2Frubysparks
> >
> >>
> >> ------------------------------
> >> June 2, 2012
> >> Pain Pills Add Cost and Delays to Job Injuries By BARRY
> >> MEIER<
> http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/m/barry_meier/index.html
> >
> >>
> >> Workplace insurers are accustomed to making billions of dollars in
> payments
> >> each year, with the biggest sums going to employees hurt in major
> >> accidents, like those mangled by machines or crushed in building
> collapses.
> >>
> >> Now they are dealing with another big and fast-growing cost — payouts to
> >> workers with routine injuries who have been treated with strong
> >> painkillers, including many who do not return to work for months, if
> ever.
> >>
> >> Workplace insurers spend an estimated $1.4 billion annually on narcotic
> >> painkillers, or opioids. But they are also finding that the
> medications, if
> >> used too early in treatment, too frequently or for too long, can drive
> up
> >> associated disability payouts and medical expenses by delaying an
> >> employee’s return to work.
> >>
> >> Workers who received high doses of opioid painkillers to treat injuries
> >> like back strain stayed out of work three times longer than those with
> >> similar injuries who took lower doses, a 2008 study of claims by the
> >> California Workers Compensation Institute found. When medical care and
> >> disability payments are combined, the cost of a workplace injury is nine
> >> times higher when a strong narcotic like OxyContin is used than when a
> >> narcotic is not used, according to a 2010 analysis by Accident Fund
> >> Holdings, an insurer that operates in 18 states.
> >>
> >> “What we see is an association between the greater use of opioids and
> >> delayed recovery from workplace injuries,” said Alex Swedlow, the head
> of
> >> research at the California Workers Compensation Institute.
> >>
> >> The use of narcotics to treat occupational injuries is part of a broader
> >> problem involving what many experts say is the excessive use of drugs
> like
> >> OxyContin, Percocet and
> >> Duragesic<
> http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/health/diseasesconditionsandhealthtopics/duragesic_drug/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier
> >.
> >> But workplace injuries are drawing particular interest because the drugs
> >> are widely prescribed to treat common problems like back pain, even
> though
> >> there is little evidence that they provide long-term benefits.
> >>
> >> Along with causing
> >> drowsiness<
> http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/symptoms/drowsiness/overview.html?inline=nyt-classifier
> >and
> >> lethargy<
> http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/symptoms/fatigue/overview.html?inline=nyt-classifier
> >,
> >> high doses of opioids can lead to addiction, and they can have other
> >> serious side effects, including fatal overdoses.
> >>
> >> Between 2001 and 2008, narcotics
> >> prescriptions<
> http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/specialtopic/getting-a-prescription-filled/overview.html?inline=nyt-classifier
> >as
> >> a share of all drugs used to treat workplace injuries jumped 63
> >> percent,
> >> according to insurance industry data. Costs have also soared.
> >>
> >> In California, for example, workplace insurers spent $252 million on
> >> opioids in 2010, a figure that represented about 30 percent of all
> >> prescription costs; in 2002, opioids accounted for 15 percent of drug
> >> expenditures.
> >>
> >> As a result, states are struggling to find ways to reverse the trend,
> and
> >> some of them have issued new pain treatment guidelines, or are expected
> to
> >> do so soon. These states include New York, Colorado, Texas and
> Washington.
> >> Insurers are also trying to influence how physicians prescribe the
> drugs.
> >>
> >> Doctors in four states — Louisiana, Massachusetts, New York and
> >> Pennsylvania — appear to be the biggest prescribers of the drugs for
> >> workers’ injuries, according to a review of data from 17 states by the
> >> Workers Compensation Research Institute, a group in Cambridge, Mass.
> >>
> >> Painkiller-related costs are also hitting taxpayers, who underwrite
> >> coverage for public employees like police officers and firefighters,
> >> experts say. In February, one major underwriter, the American
> International
> >> Group, said that it would no longer sell backup coverage to workplace
> >> insurers, citing rising pain treatment expenses as one reason.
> >>
> >> There is little question that strong pain
> >> medications<
> http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/specialtopic/pain-medications/overview.html?inline=nyt-classifier
> >can
> >> help some patients return to work and remain productive. But injured
> >> workers who are put on high doses of the drugs can develop chronic pain
> and
> >> face years of difficult treatments. It is not clear how, or if, the
> drugs
> >> are involved in the process, but when pain becomes chronic, the cost of
> a
> >> commonplace injury can equal a crippling one, experts said.
> >>
> >> “Some of these claims look like someone who fell down an elevator shaft
> and
> >> had multiple injuries,” said Dr. Edward J. Bernacki, the director of the
> >> division of occupational and environmental medicine at Johns Hopkins
> >> University in Baltimore.
> >>
> >> For decades, workers’ compensation plans, which vary by state, have been
> >> plagued by problems like lengthy legal battles over an injury’s
> financial
> >> value. But it is in recent years that opioid painkillers have emerged
> as a
> >> major driver of costs, experts said.
> >>
> >> Accident Fund Holdings examined its claims and found that the cost of a
> >> typical workplace injury — the sum of an employee’s medical expenses and
> >> lost wage payments — was about $13,000. But when a worker was
> prescribed a
> >> short-acting painkiller like Percocet, that cost tripled to $39,000 and
> >> tripled again to $117,000 when a stronger longer-acting opioid like
> >> OxyContin was prescribed, said Jeffrey Austin White, an executive with
> the
> >> insurer, which is based in Lansing, Mich.
> >>
> >> In a sense, insurers are experiencing the consequences of their own
> >> policies. During the last decade, they readily reimbursed doctors for
> >> prescribing painkillers while eliminating payments for treatments that
> did
> >> not rely on drugs, like therapy.
> >>
> >> Those policies may “have created a monster,” said Dr. Bernyce M.
> Peplowski,
> >> the medical director of the State Compensation Insurance Fund of
> >> California, a quasi-public agency.
> >>
> >> For patients, such policies had consequences.
> >>
> >> Dr. Eugenio Martinez, a physician in the Boston area who specializes in
> >> rehabilitative medicine, said one patient, a former waitress who hurt
> her
> >> back five years ago in a fall, recently won a court fight to force her
> >> insurer to pay for physical
> >> therapy<
> http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/health/diseasesconditionsandhealthtopics/physicaltherapy/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier
> >.
> >> The insurer had cut off those payments five years ago after a few
> sessions,
> >> and the woman, now disabled, had no option but to take strong
> painkillers,
> >> Dr. Martinez said. “It certainly did not help that she was cut off,” he
> >> said.
> >>
> >> Nationwide, data suggests that a vast majority of narcotic drugs used to
> >> treat occupational injuries are prescribed by a tiny percentage of
> doctors
> >> who treat injured workers; in California, for example, that figure is
> just
> >> 3 percent. Also, the bulk of such prescriptions go to a relatively small
> >> percentage of injured workers, including those who might be addicted to
> the
> >> drugs or those who sell them, experts said.
> >>
> >> Several companies, like Accident Fund Holdings and Liberty Mutual, have
> set
> >> up programs in which pain experts contact doctors identified as high
> >> prescribers to discuss their practices. The State Compensation Insurance
> >> Fund of California has also instituted a policy that requires approval
> for
> >> a doctor to prescribe an opioid for over 60 days.
> >>
> >> Insurers say they are making progress in reducing overuse of the drugs.
> But
> >> their ability to influence physicians is limited because workers’
> >> compensation plans can allow employees to see any doctor. So several
> states
> >> have or will soon adopt new pain treatment guidelines for doctors who
> treat
> >> workers.
> >>
> >> In New York, one proposal would require a doctor to refer a patient who
> is
> >> not improving to a pain specialist when an opioid dose exceeds a certain
> >> level, said Dr. Elain Sobol Berger, the associate medical director of
> the
> >> state’s workers’ compensation board. Washington State has already
> adopted
> >> such a policy.
> >>
> >> Dr. Sobol Berger added that the New York rules, which are expected to be
> >> proposed this year, will also emphasize nondrug treatments for pain. “We
> >> know that there is a significant problem with the management of chronic
> >> pain and the use of opioids,” she said.
> >>
> >> Some insurers, like the California state fund, have also started paying
> for
> >> alternative approaches like specialized psychotherapy or are trying to
> get
> >> addicted workers into treatment. Other companies are also checking on
> >> long-disabled workers.
> >>
> >> Mark Kulakowski, a 57-year-old former warehouse worker from Peabody,
> Mass.,
> >> injured his back more than three decades ago while lifting a box. He has
> >> not worked since 1995. Since his injury, he has taken narcotic
> painkillers
> >> and has had a long list of failed treatments.
> >>
> >> Recently, his insurer, Liberty Mutual, sought to have a nurse accompany
> him
> >> to his next doctor’s appointment, a suggestion he welcomed if it could
> lead
> >> to taking fewer painkillers.
> >>
> >> “It just drains everything out of you,” he said.
> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >> Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
> >> art.deco.studios at gmail.com
> >>
> >>
> >
> > =======================================================
> > List services made available by First Step Internet,
> > serving the communities of the Palouse since 1994.
> >              http://www.fsr.net
> >         mailto:Vision2020 at moscow.com
> > =======================================================
>



-- 
Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
art.deco.studios at gmail.com
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.fsr.com/pipermail/vision2020/attachments/20120604/ccfadf89/attachment-0001.html>


More information about the Vision2020 mailing list