The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health and Safe Med LA begin the New Year with renewed commitment to their goal of reducing prescription drug abuse deaths in LA County by 20 percent by 2020.

During the past decade, nearly 400 opioid-related annual deaths were registered in Los Angeles County. From 2006-2013, Los Angeles County experienced a 30% increase in opioid-related hospitalizations and a 170% increase in opioid-related ER visits.

“Pain is one of the most common complaints among emergency room and urgent care patients, yet there can be great variability among clinicians in the management of pain. It is important to improve consistency in practice in this area,” said Jeffrey Gunzenhauser, MD, MPH, Interim Health Officer of LA County. “Safe Med LA is taking a multifaceted approach to address the opioid epidemic by focusing on clinical practices that emphasize patient safety to assure patients are provided relief from pain without the risk for opioid medication abuse and diversion into the community.”

Safe Med LA has mobilized and taken up the U.S. Surgeon General’s call to action to address the opioid epidemic. Major physician groups, health plans, and health care systems have agreed to adopt clinical prescribing guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and the American Academy of Emergency Medicine and implement them to deliver safe and effective pain management and substance use management for patients in LA County.

According to the CDC Guideline for Prescribing Opioids for Chronic Pain, while opioid medication is effective for moderate to severe acute pain and for the management of cancer pain, there is little evidence that opioid medications are effective for chronic pain. In fact, several studies now report improvement in pain when opioid medications are reduced or discontinued.

Safe Med LA offers patient education handouts that provide the following tips:

– Have only one provider and one pharmacy help you with pain

– Accept a limited amount of pain prescriptions

– Do not ask your provider for long acting pain medications such as OxyContin, Fentanyl, Methadone and others

“It is our responsibility as health care leaders and physicians to assure that we are not putting patients and our community at risk of real harm,” said Joel Hyatt, MD, emeritus assistant regional medical director, Community Health Improvement, Kaiser Permanente Southern California, and chair of the Safe Med LA Medical Practice Action Team.

Safe Med LA is the largest cross-sector coalition in California that takes a coordinated, multi-pronged approach to comprehensively address the prescription drug abuse epidemic in LA County. There are nine action teams focusing on six priority areas including reducing over-prescribing in LA County’s 77 Emergency Departments, 80-160 Urgent Care Clinics, general medical practice in 10-12 major medical groups and care delivery systems, and dental practices.

Additional Information

Safe Med LA: www.safemedla.org
U.S. Surgeon General’s Call to Action: http://turnthetiderx.org
CDC Guideline: www.cdc.gov/drugoverdose/prescribing/resources.html