Physician practices have rights under Colorado law that can be exercised to reduce health plan barriers to care, thanks to more than a decade of advocacy by the Colorado Medical Society and our allies, chiefly the network of local component medical societies. 

To help physicians and practice managers understand what those rights are, CMS has compiled physician protection statutes into helpful summaries and incorporated this information into a searchable members-only online database -- Know Your Legal Rights. Go to www.cms.org/kylr  to explore this invaluable resource. (Users must be logged in with their CMS.org credentials to access Know Your Legal Rights. Staff of CMS members can request a login from membership@cms.org.)

Legal rights for physicians advocated by CMS include but are not limited to:  physician profiling, prior authorization and referrals, telehealth, anti-retaliation, narrow networks, timely payment, contracting, and appeals. This is your medical society dues dollars at work, and CMS and your component society will continue working with the General Assembly and the state's regulators to enact and refine laws and rules governing medical practice so you can get back to what you do best -- caring for patients.

Explore Know Your Legal Rights today. View a two-minute instructional "how-to" video on Know Your Legal Rights here.

The American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM) and the American Medical Association (AMA) jointly announced the release of a concept paper detailing a groundbreaking alternative payment model (APM) that could revolutionize how patients with opioid use disorder are treated.

The new payment model, known as Patient-Centered Opioid Addiction Treatment (P-COAT), is expected to increase the number of patients with opioid use disorder who are able to lead satisfying, productive lives through successful management of their condition while also reducing health care spending on costs associated with addiction, such as emergency department visits and hospitalizations.

The new payment model seeks to increase utilization of and access to medications for the treatment of opioid use disorder by providing the appropriate financial support to successfully treat patients and broaden the coordinated delivery of medical, psychological, and social support services. P-COAT is also designed to support office-based opioid treatment to facilitate coordination between multiple treatment providers. Previously, payment for these services has been segregated, which contributes to patient difficulties receiving comprehensive care.

The P-COAT APM is based on research showing that medications combined with psychosocial supports is effective in treating individuals with opioid use disorder. Unfortunately, the current physician payment system offers little support for the coordination of behavioral, social and other support services that patients being treated for opioid use disorder need in addition to their medication. Non-face-to-face services -- such as phone calls and email consultations with patients -- in addition to better coordination between specialists, outpatient treatment programs and other health providers such as emergency rooms, are essential to the delivery of effective, evidence-based treatment to the individuals who need it.

For more information about the P-COAT APM, review ASAM's issue brief here.

Opioid prescriptions in the United States decreased 22 percent between 2013 and 2017, according to a new study from the IQVIA Institute for Human Data Science titled, "Medicine Use and Spending in the U.S.: A Review of 2017 and Outlook to 2022."

The American Medical Association praises this progress and encourages continued focus on evidence-based treatment. 

"A 22-percent decrease in opioid prescriptions nationally between 2013 and 2017 reflects the fact that physicians and other health care professionals are increasingly judicious when prescribing opioids," said Patrice A. Harris, MD, MA, chair of the AMA Opioid Task Force. 

"It is notable that every state has experienced a decrease, but this is tempered by the fact that deaths related to heroin and illicit fentanyl are increasing at a staggering rate, and deaths related to prescription opioids also continue to rise. These statistics again prove that simply decreasing prescription opioid supplies will not end the epidemic. We need well-designed initiatives that bring together public and private insurers, policymakers, public health infrastructure, and communities with the shared goal to improve access and coverage for comprehensive pain management and treatment for substance use disorders."

The IQVIA report also found that prescription opioid dosage volume -- measured in morphine milligram equivalents (MME) -- decreased 12 percent in 2017, the biggest annual drop in more than 25 years.  Previously, prescription opioid volume had increased each year since 1992, peaking in 2011. But the report said this trend was reversed due to a combination of regulatory and legislative restrictions, tighter clinical prescribing guidelines and greater reimbursement controls, all of which resulted in decreases of about 4 percent per year from 2012-2016.

In 2015, the AMA launched a Task Force to Reduce Opioid Abuse and continues to work with state medical societies to address legislation and regulation ranging from developing effective prescription drug monitoring programs, continuing medical education, restrictions on treatment for opioid use disorder as well as enactment of naloxone access and Good Samaritan overdose protections.

To learn more about AMA efforts to end the opioid epidemic, visit end-opioid-epidemic.org.