PROFESSIONPhysicians told not to fear discipline for pain treatmentMedical boards are better at evaluating pain-management cases, but pain specialists still warn doctors to be careful to provide appropriate care.By Damon Adams, AMNews staff. June 16, 2003. New studies have a message for doctors who prescribe pain medication: Don't fear discipline from medical boards or criminal prosecution if you follow pain guidelines and appropriately prescribe medications. Three studies concerning medical boards, prosecution and pain-treatment guidelines are published in the Spring 2003 issue of the peer-reviewed Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics. A survey of 38 medical boards found boards were abandoning drug quantity as a marker of questionable practice and assessing instead whether a doctor properly evaluated a patient and followed the board's pain-treatment guidelines. A second study of county prosecutors in Oregon, Maryland, Washington and Connecticut found the likelihood of investigation or prosecution "extremely low." A third study said more boards had adopted pain-management guidelines but recommended that they take greater steps to train investigators about pain standards and circulate guidelines to physicians. "Boards are becoming more sophisticated. They're trying to discern between drug diversion and appropriate prescribing for pain. Doctors should not be fearful if they're trying to legitimately treat pain and follow the guidelines established by the state board," said Diane E. Hoffmann, co-author of the study of 38 boards and director of the Law and Health Care Program at the University of Maryland School of Law, Baltimore. Doctors who specialize in pain treatment said the studies would not reduce physician fears or purge images of armed drug enforcement agents sweeping into a doctor's office. [...]Full text of AMNews content is available to AMA members and paid subscribers.
Copyright 2003 American Medical Association. All rights reserved.
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