The Federation of State Medical Boards (FSMB) announced today that the nation's state medical boards have kicked off a multi-state effort to educate health care professionals on the safe and responsible prescribing of extended-release (ER) and long-acting (LA) opioid analgesics for patients with chronic pain.
"We are very pleased that this important initiative to provide prescribers with the latest knowledge on the safe, responsible prescribing of opioid analgesics is underway," said Humayun Chaudhry, DO, President and CEO of the FSMB. "State medical boards are ideally positioned to provide educational resources to help the licensees in their states learn safe, responsible prescribing of opioid analgesics."
In collaboration with several partners, the FSMB and its philanthropic arm, the FSMB Foundation, received a Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy (REMS) grant from the ER/LA Opioid Analgesics REMS Program Companies to provide educational programming in ER/LA prescribing to health care professionals. The grant provided resources for the FSMB and FSMB Foundation to award REMS grants to state medical boards to conduct free live seminars on ER/LA prescribing in their respective states, as well as free online continuing medical education resources at www.fsmb.org/safeprescribing. The collaboration is led by the University of Nebraska Medical Center and also includes partners CE City and the France Foundation.
The Louisiana State Board of Medical Examiners and the Arizona Board of Osteopathic Examiners in Medicine and Surgery recently became the first of 21 state medical board grant recipients to conduct live CME seminars. Grants were also awarded to the Alabama Board of Medical Examiners, Arizona Medical Board, Medical Board of California, Osteopathic Medical Board of California, Connecticut Medical Examining Board, District of Columbia Board of Medicine, Florida Board of Osteopathic Medicine, Georgia Composite Medical Board, Illinois Division of Professional Regulation, Iowa Board of Medicine, Maine Board of Licensure in Medicine, Nevada State Board of Medical Examiners, New York State Office of Professional Medical Conduct, North Carolina Medical Board, Oklahoma State Board of Osteopathic Examiners, Pennsylvania State Board of Medicine, Rhode Island Board of Medical Licensure and Discipline, South Dakota Board of Medical and Osteopathic Examiners, and Texas Medical Board.
The Food and Drug Administration has mandated that manufacturers of ER/LA opioid analgesics make available comprehensive prescriber education in the safe use of these medications, with the goal of reducing serious adverse outcomes resulting from inappropriate prescribing, misuse and abuse of these drugs - while maintaining patient access to pain medications. Given the broad spectrum of health care providers who prescribe opioids, the educational activities will be targeted to a multidisciplinary, interprofessional audience of prescribers. However, the primary audience for the program are clinicians who are registered with the DEA, eligible to prescribe Schedule 2 and 3 drugs, and have written at least one ER/LA opioid prescription in the past year.
Free CME available online:
In addition to the free, live seminars available under the grant, prescribers also have access to the educational curriculum via a free, online CME activity found at www.fsmb.org/safeprescribing. The "Extended-Release and Long-Acting Opioids: Assessing Risks, Safe Prescribing" activity qualifies for Continuing Medical Education AMA PRA Category 1 Credit(s)™ and AOA Category 2B Credit(s).
About the program:
• Content based on the work of the nation's leading experts in opioid prescribing and patient risk assessment
• Free, user-friendly online webinar and other resources that can be accessed at any time
• Strong emphasis on better understanding opioid prescribing and building risk assessment into prescribing practices
• Six clinical-practice modules offer a consistent and reliable approach to safe prescribing
What prescribers will learn:
• How to appropriately assess patients for the treatment of pain with ER/LA opioid analgesics, including analyzing risks versus potential benefits
• How to assess patients' risk of abuse, including substance use and psychiatric history
• How to identify state and federal regulations on opioid prescribing
• Effective strategies for starting therapy, modifying dosing or discontinuing use of ER/LA opioid analgesics in patients with pain
• New ways of managing ongoing therapy with ER/LA opioid analgesics
• How to incorporate effective counseling of patients and caregivers
• Valuable product-specific drug information related to ER/LA opioid analgesics
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