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President Trump signed four executive orders to try to lower drug prices. The first would allow importation of drugs fro Canada. The second would require the any discounts from drug companies to middlemen be passed n to the patients. The third would lower insulin costs and the fourth would allow Medicare to purchase drugs at the same price as other countries pay.
New York has passed and sent to the Governor a bill to get rid of much of the shield for medical malpractice for nursing homes, hospitals and other healthcare facilities over Covid liability. It sheds the protection for Covid issues only not others that were not directly Covid related.
Florida passed a law prohibiting practitioners and students from doing pelvic exams on patients without written consent. It exempted court ordered exams and those where exams are necessary to avoid substantial and irreversible permanent impairment. The medical community has now asked the Medical Board for declaratory statements to find out if this includes male patients and exams where body parts are viewed but not touched. They want to make sure males are not included as also pelvic surgery or catheter insertions are not included.
North Carolina has a new law which takes away step therapy. This is where insurers would not pay for physician ordered drugs until the patient was tried on something less expensive first.
The New Hampshire Board of Medicine has reprimanded Dr. Joshua Greenspan for following the federal guidelines for narcotics a little to rigidly. He told a long time oxy patient that he was going to reduce his meds due to the guidelines and without any thought as to what this would do to the patient. He also mis-read the guidelines. He eventually stopped treating the patient after the patient failed a pill count and ended up in the hospital for threatening suicide.
The Ohio Nursing Board has suspended the licenses of two nurses involved with Mount Carmel. They were accused of helping Dr. Husel who is accused of killing patients. His trial is set for later and he has entered a plea of not guily.
The FDA has issued a guideline stating that physicians who prescribe narcotics should inform their patients about Narcan. If the patient is at a higher risk for overdose then the physician should prescribe Narcan along with the narcotic.
DISCLAIMER: Although this article is updated periodically, it reflects the author's point of view at the
time of publication. Nothing in this article constitutes legal advice. Readers
should consult with their own legal counsel before acting on any of the
information presented.