While long-term care continues to struggle between providing opioids for residents in pain and the ramifications from a national epidemic of overdoses, multiple attorneys general are now asking the courts to decide whether the pharmaceutical companies who marketed the drugs and downplayed their addictive nature should be held responsible for the consequences of the crisis.
Alaska Attorney General Jahna Lindemuth (Ind) filed a lawsuit in October against Purdue Pharma, the makers of OxyContin, alleging that the state’s opioid epidemic is largely caused by the manufacturer’s campaign to “persuade doctors and patients that compassionate treatment of pain requires opioids and that opioids can be used long-term to treat chronic pain without causing abuse and addiction.”
The lawsuit follows similar recent lawsuits against Purdue and other opioid manufacturers and distributors filed in Illinois, Ohio, Oklahoma, Mississippi, New Jersey and Washington state, as well as in several counties and cities across the nation.
A study last year in Medical Care estimated the annual cost of opioid overdose, abuse and dependence at $78.5 billion.
These lawsuits appear to be one way for jurisdictions to try to recoup some of these costs, though some defense lawyers note that opioids are regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which may pose a fundamental weakness to the claims.
How these lawsuits might affect the ability of long-term care patients to obtain access to pain medications was unclear at press time.
It’s possible that some of the suggested mitigation techniques for the epidemic — including greater adoption and oversight of state prescription drug monitoring programs and the promotion of non-opioid based therapies for pain — could make it harder for seniors to access necessary pain medicines.
From the December 01, 2017 Issue of McKnight's Long-Term Care News
