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Lately, the medical profession has begun to embrace the need for prescription drug addiction-related medications to help provide a ray of hope for people with opioid use disorder (OUD). However, a recent study by clinical scientists at Oregon Health and Sciences University (OHSU) in Portland found that insurance rules are restricting the use of the prescription drug, buprenorphine, among Medicare beneficiaries.
Buprenorphine is considered an effective and safe drug for treating addiction to heroin and other types of opioids, helping to decrease deaths caused by heroin. According to study co-author Dr. Todd Korthuis, chief of addiction medicine at OHSU, patients given buprenorphine are seen to return to their pre-addiction healthy state.
Ironic move by Medicare insurance companies
In an OHSU press release, Dr. Korthuis said that ironically, while insurance companies offering Medicare policies make it quite difficult for doctors to prescribe buprenorphine, they are making it relatively easier for them to prescribe pain relievers. opioids that led to the current opioid epidemic. .
For the purpose of this study, clinical scientists conducted an analysis of data pertaining to the Medicare Part D prescription drug plan and noted that due to the increasing use of certain preauthorization conditions, the prescription of buprenorphine was falling. Increasingly restricted among insurance beneficiaries who enrolled in Medicare plans between 2007 and 2018. Insurers commonly use prior authorization conditions to restrict or manage access to certain drugs to restrict costs.
The study findings revealed that around 90 percent of insurance plans offered unrestricted buprenorphine in 2007. However, the percentage dropped to almost 35 percent in 2018. On the other hand, during the period mentioned above, the Percentage of plans that cover prescription opioids such as OxyContin without limitations, increased from 93 percent to 100 percent.
The researchers stated that factors influencing buprenorphine restrictions may reflect inaccurately perceived drug-associated risks, such as financial considerations or social norms associated with addiction. The findings of this study were recently published in a research letter in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).
Benefits of prescribing buprenorphine
Approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), buprenorphine is one of three drugs approved by the FDA to treat OUD and helps relieve withdrawal symptoms and associated pain and discomfort. Daniel Hartung, associate professor at the Oregon State University School of Pharmacy, said that because Medicare does not cover or never cover methadone, the other anti-opioid drug prescribed for the treatment of patients battling OUD, it is important that provide access to buprenorphine.
According to the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), prescription drugs such as buprenorphine are an effective means of treating opioid addiction. Unfortunately, Dr. Korthuis said, many people still hold the view that drug addiction treatment isn’t really the road to recovery. But scientific evidence supports the fact that drugs like buprenorphine have a higher recovery success rate than simply resorting to abstinence-only approaches.
Seeking help for prescription drug addiction
Millions of people have lost their lives to the opioid crisis that is currently raging in the United States, while millions more face the same situation. There’s no question that it would take a gigantic effort to deal with the prescription drug crisis.
