The FDA has approved this drug, but across New England there’s worry that the drug will only add fuel to the fire of the region’s opiate addiction problem. Lawmakers, governors, health care leaders, are all weighing in with different ideas about how to avoid abuse and yet still help those patients in pain.
GUESTS:
- Dr. Gil Fanciullo – professor of anesthesiology at Dartmouth Medical School and director of pain management at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, which has said its physicians will not prescribe Zohydro
- Peggy Gilmour – Democratic Senator from Hollis. She has a background in nursing and hospice care, and has served on the Health, Education, and Human Services Committee.
CALLOUTS:
- Dr. Joshua Greenspan – founder of American Pain Institute in Portsmouth. He’s Board Certified in the Specialty of Pain Management.
- James Vara - Assistant Attorney General and head the Drug Prosecution Unit
LINKS:
- NHPR's digital journalist looked at some of thelegislative efforts to limit Zohydro in the state
- the latest on Massachusetts' struggles to limit Zohydro there
- voluntary efforts by doctors and pharmacists to postpone Zohydro
- a chronic pain patient's perspective on the "opioid crisis" media coverage
