Source: State Medical Board of Ohio
The Joint Committee on Agency Rule Review (JCARR) will meet on Thursday, November 15, to review the Chronic and Sub-Acute Pain Prescribing Rules proposed by the State Medical Board of Ohio (SMBO).
The amendments to rules 4731-11-01 and 4731-11-02 and new rule 4731-11-14 establish the requirements and procedures for prescribing for subacute and chronic pain. The rules will apply to physicians and physician assistants. A public hearing on the proposed rules, and the proposed rescission of the current intractable pain rules found in Chapter 4731-21 of the Administrative Code, was held on September 26.
As a result of comments, several proposed changes to the rules were taken into consideration.
- The definition of chronic pain was amended to state: “Chronic pain” does not include pain associated with a terminal condition or with a progressive disease that, in the normal course of progression, may reasonably be expected to result in a terminal condition.
- The type of providers who may write prescriptions for >120 MED were expanded from pain management specialists to include board-certified hospice and palliative care providers.
- Requests to substantially increase the frequency of required drug screens were rejected as it would have created hardship for patients (cost, travel, delay of receiving prescriptions).
- Comments were provided urging the SMBO to mandate co-prescribing of Naloxone starting at 50 MEDs as recommended by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). This amendment was not made, as the CDC does NOT call for mandatory co-prescribing, rather an offer from the prescriber to also provide Naloxone.
If approved by JCARR, the SMBO will vote to adopt the rules with an effective date in late December 2018.