Ask senators to defeat pain relief bill - vote is imminent -- September 2000 -- FP Report

September 2000 • Volume 6 • Number 9

Ask senators to defeat pain relief bill -- vote is imminent

BY JANE STOEVER

Pain management: top priority for the terminally ill

It's crunch time for contacting Congress about the pain relief bill. What's up? The final vote -- this time in the Senate -- is expected late this month on the Pain Relief Promotion Act, H.R. 2260. The Academy has fought the legislation for more than two years. Now the AAFP is seeking your help in letting senators know why the bill won't work.

H.R. 2260 challenges Oregon's assisted suicide law. The bill calls for training Drug Enforcement Administration officers to review physicians' prescriptions of federally controlled substances for terminally ill patients.

The Academy continues to oppose assisted suicide as being contrary to physicians' responsibility to save lives, to heal.

But this bill -- designed to relieve pain and prevent assisted suicides -- could backfire. It could tie physicians' hands in countering pain effectively.

AAFP letter. "Proper and effective pain management is the number one priority of terminally ill patients and their families," said AAFP Board Chair Lanny Copeland, M.D., of Albany, Ga., in an Aug. 3 letter to all senators. "We are concerned that this bill could leave federal agents second-guessing physician prescribing of necessary pain medication."

Penalties. H.R. 2260 could make physicians liable for civil and criminal penalties for prescribing pain medicine patients needed.

Coalition. The Academy has been a leader of a 41-member coalition of national and state organizations fighting H.R. 2260. The bill's opponents include the American Geriatrics Society, American Cancer Society, American Nurses Association, Oncology Nurses Society, American Pharmaceutical Association and American Pain Foundation.

Speak Out. To e-mail your senators or review a sample letter urging them to defeat H.R. 2260, open http://www.aafp.org/gov and click on "Speak Out" and then on "Write to Congress."

Act now. The House of Representatives passed the bill last year by a bipartisan vote of 271-156. Please contact your senators right away and ask them to defeat the bill.

FP Report is published by the AAFP News Department.
Copyright © 2000 by American Academy of Family Physicians.

FP Report | Headlines | AAFP Home | Search