Essay Law and Health Care System Administration

Opioid addiction is so prevalent in the healthcare system because of the countless number of hospital patients being treated for chronic pain. While opioid analgesics have beneficial painkilling properties, they also yield detrimental dependence and addiction. There is a legitimate need for the health care system to provide powerful medications because prolonged pain limits activities of daily living, work productivity, quality of life, etc. (Taylor, 2015). Patients need to receive appropriate pain treatment, however, opioids need to be prescribed after careful consideration of the benefits and risks.

While our major access to these drugs is doctors, we cannot simply lay blame on them, as there is not enough knowledge about these treatments to correctly appropriate drugs, and therefore extra is given (Hemphill 373). Alexander of the Department of Epidemiology of the Journal of the American Medical Association, states that “There are serious gaps in the knowledge base regarding opioid use for other chronic nonmalignant pain” (Alexander 1865-1866), which leads to the unfortunately large number of leftover drugs. In fact, the main place that people get their drugs are from leftover prescriptions (Hemphill 373).

The United States of America has had a war against drugs since the 37th president, Richard Nixon, declared more crimination on drug abuse in June 1971. From mid-1990s to today, a crisis challenges the health department and government on opioid regulation, as millions of Americans die due overdoses of painkillers. Opioids are substances used as painkillers, and they range from prescription medications to the illegal drug, heroin. Abusing these substances can cause a dependency or addiction, which can lead to overdoses, physical damages, emotional trauma, and death. To ease the crisis, physicians are asked to depend on alternatives to pain management. Law enforcement cracks down on profiting drug-dealers and heroin abusers. People are warned against misusing opioids. The controversy begins for those who suffer from chronic pain, because they depend on opioids. There’s so a correlation to the 1980s cocaine epidemic, and people are upset over racial discrimination. Nonetheless, the best way to avoid this crisis is to recover the people at risk, reduce inappropriate opioid description, and have a proper response.

Considerable cautions have been obtained throughout the United States to decrease the misuse of prescription opioids and helps to minimize opioid overdoses and related complications. Even though the pain medications have a significant part in the treatment of acute and chronic pain situations, it sometimes happen that the high dose prescription or the prescribed medications, without having enough monitoring, can create bad outcomes. It is always a dilemma for the providers to find who is really in need of pain medications and to identify those who are questionably misusing opioids.

Vivek Murthy, a U.S. Surgeon General, said he wanted to change the way Doctors have been taught to handle pain management for the last twenty to thirty years (824). The reason Murthy wants to do this is because while he was reading a training document for nurses and doctors it claimed , "If your patient is concerned that they may develop dependence on opioids, you can safely reassure them that addiction to opioids is very rare in patients who have pain" (823). This document also reassured doctors they could prescribe opioids as a long-term treatment. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention advises doctors that pain-relieving effects may wear off for long-term users(824). This explains how opioids can be used to deal with pain management, but if used as a long-term treatment it can create an

It has become standard practice for physicians and other prescribers to write a months’ worth of opioid medication for minor, short-term pain conditions. Just two decades ago, opiates were viewed by the medical community as dangerous, addictive and were limited to use only for patients with acute trauma, for end-of-life care, and in cases of cancer pain. Current prescribing practices provide an excess of prescriptions annually, enough for every man and women in the U.S. to have a bottle of opiates (ASAM, 2016). The same formal oath that practitioners pledge to “First, to do no harm,” also advocates that regardless of the treatment focus on disease or ailment, above all, it is a human life that requires sympathy and care. The risks and adverse

Patients would regularly take their prescribed opioid medications in order to relieve the symptoms of their pain. In

Getting involved with opioids now days seem fairly easy, our young ones are becoming addicted to these medications because our doctors don’t care. Doctors are just signing off prescriptions left and right. But in reality physicians have responsibilities, such as obtaining physical examination, a medical history, develop a written treatment plan for their patients, and comply with controlled substances laws and regulations. In a lot of cases doctors don’t want to deal with their patients so they will just prescribed medications to get people in and out of the office, to keep up with their hectic schedule, and don’t want to find the root of the cause, or maybe they just don’t have the time. Other ways to get opioids include within relatives, visits out of the country, pharmacy and hospital theft, and “stealing from grandma’s cabinet” (Inciardi, Surratt, Kurtz, and Cicero 2007). Despite the overload of opioids in our country almost 80% of the world 's population today has no access to morphine. And an estimated 33 million people, need specialized medical care but have no access to even basic care and symptom control. This terrible lack of pain relief can be attributed to our governments need to control and regulation.

Prescription opioid abuse is the intentional use of prescribed pain medication, or analgesics, for uses other than or beyond the time limits of, what the prescription is written for. It has become a widespread problem in the United States and is growing quickly. Unfortunately, most of the blame falls on our healthcare system, which tends to take the “band aid” approach to health issues. Oftentimes, pain medications are overprescribed and undermanaged without addressing the origin of the medical ailment that is causing the pain. Due to the misconception that taking these FDA prescribed drugs are safe, rates of abuse with these drugs is on the rise. Accidental deaths due to prescription opioid overdose have increased dramatically since 1999, and surpass those caused by cocaine and heroin. Prescription opioid abuse has a tremendous negative impact on the individual, the healthcare system, and society in general. This paper will explore the trends, history, mechanisms, individual impact, societal costs, and the management and treatment of prescription opioid use and abuse.

In the United States, opioids have become a major component in healthcare because they are an exceptional method of relieving pain. For those who are recovering from a recent inpatient surgery or those with cancer who are in a great deal of pain, it is a necessity. A known problem with opioids is that they are addictive, which leads to overuse of the medication by the patient. Opioids are also highly sought after as a street drug, this leads to patients exaggerating their pain level in order to receive more pills and selling their excess medication to others. Doctors will often prescribe opioids to patients who do not need such an aggressive form of pain relief, for example, people with arthritis or who have gone through a minor outpatient surgery. This can lead to a long-term use of these pain relieving drugs and possible addiction, which goes against the original purpose of opioids. In order to solve America’s dependence on opioids, medical professionals must go back to the original method of prescribing them, that is, only short-term use for people recovering from surgeries or in pain due to cancer, instead of a long-term solution for acute pain.

The issue of pain management has been an ongoing crisis for ages. The need for solutions and methods of avoiding pain is natural, however, as time has passed, misuse of these solutions has gotten out of hand. The abuse of prescription opioids, in particular, must be acknowledged. By prescribing opioids to patients, doctors are inadvertently creating drug addicts and fueling the heroin epidemic. As patients grow tolerant to opioids, they are forced to search for stronger drugs, commit crimes, and ultimately die. Alternate solutions for pain management and regulation of opiates must be implemented in order to prevent the meaningless loss of lives.

The federal government may have a different implementation of certain legislation relating to healthcare then here in American Samoa. I personally have been to several private sectors and have not been introduced to legislation related to some Employee Benefits. Take for instance, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) of 1996 and the Pension Protection Act.

Patient provider relationships play a pivotal role in the healthcare process. This relationship helps to bridge the gap between ailments of the patient and the diagnosis and care of the provider. The need for this relationship and its propensity to create the catalyst for patients need to be fulfilled is second only to the medical knowledge of the provider and the patient 's willingness to get better. As we have moved from a biomedical perspective to a biopsychosocial perspective the relationship between provider and patient has changed from physician centered modes of communication to more of a patient centered style of communication. And with the change of view we find that a strong and cohesive bond between patient and provider is the key to the advancement and overall quality of care for the patient. According to The Impact of Patient-Centered Care on Outcomes a patient centered approach to care has a correlation to a better healthcare outcome. Focusing on the patient increases compliance of the patient.

It is said that a healthy nation is a wealthy nation. Healthcare is an important concern for every government as people get ill, accidents happen, emergencies arise and the health institutions are needed to diagnose, manage and treat the different types of ailments or diseases that may arise. The healthcare industry is divided into several areas in order to meet the health needs of anyone and everyone. All over the world, the healthcare structures are different to accommodate specific needs of the people in that demographic however the healthcare methodology in Third World Countries does not accommodate the needs of their respective inhabitants in comparison to First world Countries. The Rate of corruption, quality of healthcare institutions, lack of adequate, functional surveillance systems and problematic hygiene conditions are amongst the top reasons why the healthcare systems in third world countries are substandard in comparison to First world nations.

All four of these elements have to be shown in order to recover on a negligence claim.