Pubdate: Fri, 01 May 2015
Source: San Diego Union Tribune (CA)
Copyright: 2015 Union-Tribune Publishing Co.
Contact:  http://www.utsandiego.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/386
Note: Seldom prints LTEs from outside it's circulation area.
Author: Sherrie Rubin
Note: Rubin, an Escondido resident, is a co-founder of H.O.P.E Drug 
Awareness, Education and Treatment Inc.

MEASURE HELPS CURB PRESCRIPTION DRUG ABUSE

All parents think that their child could never overdose on drugs. How 
could that happen? They are caring, involved parents, after all.

I thought it too, until Oct. 9, 2005, when the life of our suburban 
family was shattered. Our son Aaron, then 23, overdosed on a 
prescription painkiller. Lack of oxygen to his brain brought him to 
the brink of death, and after a series of heart attacks and strokes 
and nearly four weeks in a coma, doctors told us to make his funeral 
arrangements.

Miraculously, Aaron survived. Now in a wheelchair, Aaron cannot walk 
nor speak. He can only communicate with his fingers  one for yes, and 
two for no. He's here and happy, but he is trapped in his own body. 
For the past decade, I have educated students and parents about the 
dangers of opioid abuse and misuse, and to remind parents that these 
pills may be in their own home medicine cabinets.

On this, the 10-year anniversary of Aaron's overdose, I support AB 
623, a bill that would help curb prescription drug abuse and reduce 
the number of dangerous pills available.

This bill, by Assemblyman Jim Wood, D-Healdsburg, will require 
pharmacists to inform patients how to store and dispose of opioids at 
the counter and encourage the use of a new kind of pain pill  one 
that is far harder to abuse. AB 623 would improve access and 
affordability of abuse deterrent formulations (ADF). Assemblywoman 
Marie Waldron, R-Escondido, is a co-author, demonstrating the 
bipartisan support for a bill endorsed by law enforcement groups, 
pain advocates, medical providers and the Partnership for Drug Free Kids.

ADF opioid medications provide the same pain relief as conventional 
opioids but contain properties that make crushing, cutting and 
dissolving difficult or that block the euphoric effect when it is manipulated.

Many abusers chew, crush, cut, grind or dissolve opioid pills to 
inhale or inject to create an instant "high." More than two-thirds of 
those who start out by popping pills progress to other ways to ingest 
opioids. Manipulating opioids to ingest them is the most dangerous 
type of abuse, and often the cause of overdose deaths.

In 2010, five years after Aaron's overdose, the makers of OxyContin 
changed the medication to an ADF that cannot be crushed into a 
powder. A newly published study from Harvard Medical School and 
Boston University School of Medicine found that OxyContin overdoses 
and dispensing declined substantially after ADF OxyContin was introduced.

I believe that abuse deterrent formulations could have deterred 
Aaron's abuse of OxyContin.

I never would have fathomed my loving son - a popular high school 
athlete dedicated to health and fitness - would inject opioids to get 
high. I had volunteered at his school, was a stay-at-home mom and 
thought I was involved in his life.

But I was unaware of the addiction that had gripped him. If I had 
known more about prescription drug abuse, I would have recognized the 
signs and acted.

I believe that AB 623 can prevent overdoses by encouraging the use of 
ADF pills, and by prohibiting health plans from requiring step 
therapy requirements, where a patient must try and fail on an opioid 
before getting access to an ADF opioid. It also will require health 
plans to have the same prior authorization process for opioids with 
and without ADF.

Aaron is a survivor, and I am grateful that he is here, but he's not 
the son I once knew. I grieve for that Aaron and the loss of his 
dreams, goals and potential every day.

My family founded H.O.P.E Drug Awareness, Education and Treatment 
Inc. (www.hope2gether.org) to support families in this fight against 
prescription drug abuse. Aaron joins me at schools and venues through 
out the country to warn families of the dangers lurking in their own 
medicine cabinets.

I hope that legislators will recognize that AB 623 could prevent more 
"regular kids" like Aaron from heading down this dangerous and deadly path.

Aaron is a living reminder that it can happen to anyone and that no 
family is immune.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom