AlterPolitics New Post

A Sitting NY Supreme Court Judge With Cancer Makes A Plea For Medical Marijuana

by on Thursday, May 17, 2012 at 12:29 am EDT in DOJ, Healthcare, Justice System, Politics

After being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, New York Supreme Court justice Gustin L. Reichbach found himself immersed in a world of pain and misery, brought on by months of surgery, chemotherapy and radiation.

He’s spent 40 years in the law — over two decades as a judge — and thus never could have imagined that he would one day find himself turning to marijuana to quell his unbearable suffering, as he explains in his NY Times Op Ed:

Nausea and pain are constant companions. One struggles to eat enough to stave off the dramatic weight loss that is part of this disease. Eating, one of the great pleasures of life, has now become a daily battle, with each forkful a small victory. Every drug prescribed to treat one problem leads to one or two more drugs to offset its side effects. Pain medication leads to loss of appetite and constipation. Anti-nausea medication raises glucose levels, a serious problem for me with my pancreas so compromised. Sleep, which might bring respite from the miseries of the day, becomes increasingly elusive.

Inhaled marijuana is the only medicine that gives me some relief from nausea, stimulates my appetite, and makes it easier to fall asleep. The oral synthetic substitute, Marinol, prescribed by my doctors, was useless. Rather than watch the agony of my suffering, friends have chosen, at some personal risk, to provide the substance. I find a few puffs of marijuana before dinner gives me ammunition in the battle to eat. A few more puffs at bedtime permits desperately needed sleep.

This is not a law-and-order issue; it is a medical and a human rights issue. Being treated at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, I am receiving the absolute gold standard of medical care. But doctors cannot be expected to do what the law prohibits, even when they know it is in the best interests of their patients. When palliative care is understood as a fundamental human and medical right, marijuana for medical use should be beyond controversy.

Isn’t it about time politicians began to ask themselves, “would I allow my own family member to suffer needlessly like this?”

FDA Considers Permitting Popular Prescriptions To Be Sold Over-The-Counter

by on Monday, May 7, 2012 at 10:32 pm EDT in Healthcare, Politics

In an effort to make medications more easily available to Americans, the FDA may allow prescription drugs which combat chronic illnesses, such as high cholesterol, diabetes, asthma, and migraine headaches, to be purchased over-the-counter (OTC).

The FDA outlined the rationale behind its proposal:

Getting medicines into the hands of consumers has become troublesome over the last few years. Research shows that for a variety of reasons, 20 percent of patients with prescriptions do not get them filled. In addition, the time or cost required visiting a doctor to receive a prescription or refill often stops patients.

The Food and Drug Administration thinks that some of these doctor visits can be eliminated. It is exploring ways to make drugs for common conditions available as nonprescription products. Under this paradigm, the agency would approve drugs — that would otherwise require a prescription — for over-the-counter (OTC) distribution, if certain conditions are followed.

The agency is presently in an exploratory phase, encouraging input from all stakeholders, including doctors, pharmaceuticals, insurers, pharmacists, and patients.

It should come as no surprise that the move has pitted two powerful interest groups against one another: BigPharma, who stands to gain direct access to millions of consumers, and doctors, who stand to lose a lot of office visits, and their corresponding fees, for writing prescriptions and their refills.

Pharmaceutical companies have long complained that the restrictions placed upon them in getting their medications into the hands of those who need them is more cumbersome in the U.S. than anywhere else in the world.

For example, as early as 2004, the U.K. reclassified low-doses of a commonly used statin (generic: Simvastatin 10mg) from prescription drug to OTC drug. Statins lower cholesterol levels in the blood, thereby helping to prevent strokes and heart disease. Higher doses, however, continue to require prescriptions since the potential for serious side-effects, including liver or muscle damage, increases with the dosage.

But regardless of the dosage, all statins sold in the U.S. still require prescriptions. Why is easy access to drugs like statins so important? Reuters reports:

About one in three U.S. adults has high blood pressure, which contributes to heart disease and stroke. The condition cost the United States about $76 billion in 2010, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The FDA said about a third of those with high blood pressure stop taking their medication.

The FDA is hoping to knock down the barriers that discourage these millions of Americans from taking their life-saving prescriptions.

BigPharma is obviously ecstatic about the prospects of circumventing the gatekeepers that stand between them and the public. The industry spends tens of billions of dollars ‘enticing’ doctors to prescribe their medications. A 2008 study in PLoS Medicine found that pharmaceutical companies spend an average of US $61,000 per physician per year, on physician-targeted promotions. 

Doctors, however, contend that patient consultation is essential for managing chronic conditions. This Sunday, In a USA Today op-ed, American Medical Association president Peter Carmel panned the new FDA effort, by defending the physician’s role, as well as by questioning the projected cost benefits:

As a chronic condition evolves, treatment changes are often needed from a physician. Without physician involvement, patients might take the wrong medication or dose for their needs, potentially causing harm. Self-diagnosis and treatment conflict with the care coordination and disease management that new health care payment and delivery models are trying to achieve.

Contrary to claims that this will save patients money, out-of-pocket costs for insured individuals, including those under Medicare, would increase for drugs switched from prescription to OTC status because patients would need to cover the entire cost themselves. Higher costs would make it harder for patients to afford the medication they need.

But the FDA envisions pharmacists assuming more of the medication consultation responsibilities, presently reserved for physicians. And pharmacist groups have lined up in support of the FDA proposal, including the American Pharmacists Association (APA), the National Community Pharmacists Association, the Academy of Managed Care Pharmacy, and the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy. 

The FDA also plans to take advantage of new technological advancements. Its present OTC rules were written in a time when access to information technology did not exist. But today, the agency envisions utilizing consumer interactive mechanisms (through the internet and touch-screen kiosks at pharmacies), and incorporating electronic health record information, e-prescriptions, patient portals — all of which could effectively link pharmacy, patients and providers in a dramatically new way. 

The FDA does, however, acknowledge several potential roadblocks to its proposal, including Carmel’s point above, regarding the insurance industry’s current non-reimbursement policy for OTC drugs. Other potential roadblocks mentioned, include “liability concerns, disruption of workflow for often overburdened pharmacists, [and] equipment costs.”

Here is how a new OTC policy might work (as outlined by the FDA):

To ensure safe and appropriate use, special conditions would apply to types of nonprescription products. For example, before getting a medication, you might have to talk with a pharmacist, or need to have a diagnostic test. In other cases, you might have to visit a physician to obtain the original prescription, but not to get refills. FDA is also considering whether some drugs could be a prescription drug and a nonprescription drug with conditions of safe use.

Various technologies could support this model. Kiosks in pharmacies or questionnaires on the Internet could help consumers properly diagnose a health condition and select a drug product. Such types of systems could also help consumers decide if the warnings for a drug mean that they should not take a drug or they should not combine it with certain other drugs or foods.

Another scenario for enhancing self-care could involve pharmacists that could help consumers verify their diagnosis, or decide whether the medication is right.

“Pharmacists could also reinforce directions for use,” said Woodcock.

There are a number of potential benefits for consumers from this initiative: an increase in the appropriate use of medication, decreases in health costs, greater access to health screening, easier access to needed medications, and better, more consistent treatment of common conditions.

Though there are still significant hurdles to overcome — the insurance industry’s non-reimbursement policy for OTC drugs would likely make this proposal a “no go” for all Americans — I applaud the FDA’s attempts to confront some rather obvious inefficiencies in the system.

Many Americans with chronic illnesses cannot afford office visits to a doctor, much less repeat visits, for the sole purpose of having prescriptions filled or refilled. Others cannot take off from work each and every time they need a refill, so that a doctor can write out another prescription.

Barriers, like these, discourage millions of Americans from getting the medications they need to treat serious chronic diseases, and as a result, they often end up in the ER in critical condition. This is not good for our citizenry’s health, and it only exacerbates our nation’s runaway healthcare costs.

WATCH: Insurance Company Aetna Sues Out-Of-Network Surgeons For Price Gouging Their Patients By 2,500%

by on Friday, February 3, 2012 at 3:44 pm EDT in Healthcare, Politics

Bloomberg reports that health insurer Aetna is now suing seven ‘out-of-network’ California surgery centers, for over-billing them by as much as 2,500% for standard medical procedures. A few examples of the excessive charges include:

$66,000 to treat a bunion (normally costs $3,600),

$56,980 for a ‘bedside consultation,’

$99,750 to get earwax removed,

$119,671 for lower back disc-surgery (normally $6,000)

WATCH:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkRYYI7gC6Q[/youtube]

This serves as a perfect example of how the U.S. ‘for-profit’ healthcare industry price gouges, not only at the payer level, but also at the provider level. 

A Case For Scrapping Drug Patent Monopolies As Incentive For R&D

by on Monday, August 8, 2011 at 2:59 pm EDT in Healthcare, Politics

It is widely accepted across the gamut of economic ideologies that when a monopoly exists a free marketplace becomes inefficient and fails. It fails, because without competition, a monopolist is all but guaranteed to price-gauge consumers. So it’s no wonder that US anti-trust laws were written to safeguard the marketplace from monopolistic (anti-competitive) behavior. Yet, for […]

When Compromise Means Undermining The Logical Solutions To Our Most Serious Problems

by on Tuesday, July 26, 2011 at 2:03 pm EDT in Healthcare, Politics

When Barack Obama told the New York Times he was “like a Rorschach test,” after having just defeated Hillary Clinton in the Primaries, you have to wonder if he wasn’t already laying down a narrative he could lean on in defense of all the promises he intended to break.  Make no mistake about it, Progressives […]

Candidate Obama VS President Obama On Fixing Medicare

by on Tuesday, July 26, 2011 at 10:55 am EDT in Healthcare, Politics

On the campaign trail, CANDIDATE Obama was very specific on how he intended to fix Medicare: 1. To lower Medicare costs, Candidate Obama said he would permit Medicare to negotiate prescription drug prices with the price-gauging pharmaceutical industry: [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ET5Run2G_qc[/youtube] SEN. OBAMA: But one thing I have to say, we are not going to make some […]

Here Comes The Pain: Two-thirds of States Cut Mental Health Care Funding

by on Thursday, March 10, 2011 at 1:29 pm EDT in Healthcare, Politics, Tax Policies

Despite an increase in our nation’s mental health care needs due to tens of millions of Americans having lost their jobs, and tens of thousands of military personnel returning home from war, the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) is reporting that two-thirds of states are making deep cuts to their mental health care programs. […]

Health Insurers: Without Individual Mandate, We’ll Jack Up Your Rates!

by on Tuesday, December 14, 2010 at 11:34 am EDT in Healthcare, Politics

Yesterday a Federal District Court in Virginia struck down the individual mandate part of President Obama’s new health care program.  I was admittedly thrilled-to-pieces to hear the news! With no cost controls to speak of, this bill was essentially a giveaway to the health insurance industry.  Seriously, it’s obscene that Obama would break his campaign […]

This November, Write-In “Public Option”

by on Friday, September 10, 2010 at 5:10 pm EDT in Healthcare, Politics

I met up with Stan at The Seminal at FireDogLake (FDL). I’d recently written about the rationality of we on the Left strategically boycotting the upcoming midterm elections, and had continued pushing that notion in the comments of a diary by Democratic Party flack Jason Rosenbaum, seeking help in those elections from we who had given his co-opted little party […]

Is Obama’s Health Care ‘Reform’ Plan Destined For Massachusetts’ Results?

by on Monday, July 19, 2010 at 8:25 am EDT in Healthcare, Politics

Robert J. Samuelson of the Washington Post highlights the similarities between Obama’s and Massachusetts’ health care plans — specifically, the fact neither did a thing to reign in costs — and Samuelson forewarns that the nation’s plan will likely suffer the same fate as the Bay State’s: If you want a preview of President Obama’s […]