Project tackles barriers to pain management
Creating a productive dialogue with the experts
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in Princeton, NJ, has awarded a $750,000 grant to the Pain and Policy Studies Group at the University of Wisconsin-Madison to examine and address drug regulation barriers to effective pain management.
"The reluctance of some physicians to prescribe opioid analgesics is due to excessive concerns about addiction and about being investigated for violating drug abuse-related laws and regulations," says David E. Joranson, MSSW. Joranson, director of the Pain and Policy Studies Group, heads up the new project.
The need to remove these regulatory barriers to pain drug prescribing was also a primary theme of the recent report by the Institute of Medicine’s Committee on Care at the End of Life. (See Hospice Management Advisor, July 1997, p. 78.) The group recommended reforming drug prescribing laws, regulations, and state medical board practices which impede the effective use of opioids to treat pain and suffering.
The new project proposes to do the following:
- survey all 600 members of state medical boards nationwide;
- offer these members science-based workshops and ongoing technical assistance;
- survey pharmacists on their knowledge and attitudes about opioid pain management;
- review current data on the relationship between opioids used to treat pain and drug abuse;
- establish a Web site and other resources on pain management and public policy.
Communication between docs and regulators
"We hope that this initiative will create a productive dialogue between regulators and the physicians who are most experienced in the effective use of opioids for pain management a dialogue focused on ensuring that opioid use is based on patients’ needs, not regulatory concerns," says Rosemary Gibson, foundation senior program officer. She points to a documented knowledge deficit among medical board members, which the new project will attempt to rectify.
The new project is the latest in a series of initiatives by the foundation to address documented deficiencies in care at the end of life. Other initiatives include the Last Acts Coalition, representing 72 national organizations and Promoting Excellence in End-of-Life Care, a $12-million initiative directed by veteran hospice physician Ira Byock, MD.
[Editor’s note: It was incorrectly reported in the June 1997 HMA that Byock’s program had a July 1, 1997, deadline for letters of intent from grant seekers. In fact, letters of intent will be accepted until September 1, 1997. Three-year matching grants averaging $450,000 for "innovative projects of national significance" to improve the quality of end-of-life care will be awarded in the spring of 1998. For more information, contact Byock or Jeanne Twohig, MPA, at the Practical Ethics Center, University of Montana, Missoula, MT 59813. Telephone: (406) 243-6601. Fax: (406) 243-6633.]
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