While acknowledging the safety of the approved daily doses of OTC loperamide for adults (8mg per day) and prescription loperamide (16mg per day), the FDA recently approved new package-size and package-type limits for the brand-name OTC tablet and capsule forms of the drug. Here are the products affected by the FDA’s notice:
An Oklahoma doctor wrote 19 Schedule II controlled substance prescriptions for a patient with low back pain over eight months without thoroughly documenting the patient’s history, confronting the patient over aberrant drug tests, or talking to other doctors who were prescribing the patient controlled substances. The Chief Administrative Law Judge felt the doctor should be granted a new registration, but placed on probation for one year. Acting Administrator Chuck Rosenberg disagreed. He reviewed the case and concluded that DEA proved that the doctor knew the patient was abusing or diverting the drugs and prescribed anyway. Dr. Wesley Pope’s application for a new DEA registration was denied as inconsistent with the public interest.
Last week, the U.S. Surgeon General, Dr. Vivek H. Murthy, sent a letter to 2.3 million American health professionals asking them to lead a national movement to “turn the tide” on the nation’s prescription opioid epidemic. After visiting communities hardest hit by the opioid epidemic, Dr. Murthy’s appeal to clinicians was personal:
“Everywhere I travel, I see communities devastated by opioid overdoses. I meet families too ashamed to seek treatment for addiction. And I will never forget my own patient whose opioid use disorder began with a course of morphine after a routine procedure.”
Dr. Murthy wrote that health care providers “have the unique power to end the opioid crisis.” He asked providers to commitment to this cause by pledging to:
On November 4, 2015, DEA Acting Administrator Chuck Rosenberg announced the results of the 2015 National Drug Threat Assessment Summary (NDTA). In addition to reporting in-depth findings regarding the availability and use of nine drugs of abuse, the 2015 NDTA focuses on the increasing threat of transnational criminal organizations (“TCOs”), confirming Michelle Leonhart’s testimony before her departure from the Agency about the integral role of TCOs in the “new face of organized crime.”
Last year the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the World Health Organization (WHO) published a paper on reducing opioid overdose mortality. The paper addressed opioid overdoses related to heroin use and concluded that reduction in supply is an effective measure governments can take to reduce heroin overdoses. The UNODC and