Hassan and NH Bureaucrats know better than your doctor how to treat your pain - Granite Grok

Hassan and NH Bureaucrats know better than your doctor how to treat your pain

hassannpr

Yesterday Governor Hassan sent a press release touting her signage of the new legislation regarding rule making in the prescriptions of opioids. Suddenly Maggie Hassan and her cohorts in crime in the house and senate (from both political parties) know better than your doctor how to treat your pain. Hassan must have gotten a medical degree during her failed stint as governor but didn’t to tell anyone.

The bill is House Bill 1423AN ACT relative to rulemaking for prescribing controlled drugs. Basically a board of people will decide how pain medicine should be prescribed by doctors, including how much and what dosages. A board of people who will NEVER meet you will decide for you and your doctor what your pain level is and what you should be ALLOWED to take for medication to help ease that pain.

This is “Big Daddy Government” at its finest. Legislators want to punish the many who will never abuse prescription drugs because of the few who actually do. They want to punish all of the doctors who provide good medical advice and practice because of the few who do not. The legislators who voted for this bill are handing over your medical care to a board of people rather than letting your doctor make decisions based on his or her expertise and relationship with you as a patient.

Last year senate Democrats tried to pass a bill that would limit the number of pain pills that were allowed to be prescribed per month. Hassan has also been pushing for this ridiculous “rule making” since last year. Her excuse is the opioid problem in New Hampshire. Rather than actually try to solve the issue and stop big league drug dealers (there never seem to be any real big drug busts only small time flunkies), she and legislators who support this added bureaucracy are treating all Granite Staters as if they are drug abusers.

Essentially this ‘rule-making’ board will now do what legislators haven’t done – they will make rules without laws that medical professionals will have to follow, or else. From HB 1423:

Providing for the enforcement of the prescribing rules by specifying that noncompliance with the rules may constitute unprofessional conduct under the board’s practice act.

And what are some of the rules they’ll be making?

Standards for the use of opioids for the management or treatment of acute pain:

  • Limiting the amount of days for an opioid prescription issued in an emergency department, urgent care setting, or walk-in clinic.
  • In settings where continuity of care is anticipated, each board shall establish finite limits considering dose and duration of opioid prescriptions for treatment of acute pain and appropriate timing of office follow up for persistent, unresolved acute pain.

Standards for the use of opioids for the management or treatment of chronic pain:

  • Mandatory use of written treatment agreements, such as the agreement developed by the American Academy of Pain Medicine. Treatment agreements shall include conduct that triggers the discontinuation or tapering of opioid prescriptions.
  • Establishing a requirement for periodic review conducted at reasonable intervals to reevaluate treatment plans and use of opioids.
  • Establishing a procedure for, and documenting consideration of, consultation with, or referral to a specialist for patients receiving a high morphine equivalent dose for longer than 90 days.

At least this time they have decided that patients with cancer, terminal conditions and those in long-term non-rehabilitative care will not have to suffer under their ridiculous rules.

The rest of you? Shut up and listen to the bureaucrats because they know better than your doctor how to treat your pain. And don’t forget that any time you actually need pain meds you will be instantly entered into the drug addict database, even drugs you may get for your pet. Oh and not all drugs are opioids, many are things like Aderall, Xanax and Valium.

These political hacks are using the minority of drug addicts to inflict big government, nanny-state edicts onto everyone in the state. Not only has Hassan completely lied about wanting government not to get in between women and their doctors but she has doubled-down on this very practice for everyone. Not only do Granite Staters have to suffer even more thanks to these practices but they get to pay for it as well.

Privacy? Forget about it. Good healthcare? Forget about it. Bureaucrats telling your doctor how to treat your pain? You bet. All thanks to a minority of the population who seems to continually and easily have access to illegal drugs in a state that never seems to get the big fish in the illegal drug dealing “industry.” Because of their failure, you have to suffer the consequences, literally.

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