State bill restricts opioid prescriptions to 7 days worth of medication

Colorado state legislators have introduced a bill that would limit the number of opioid pills doctors could prescribe for acute pain.

It would allow doctors to prescribe seven days worth of opioids if that patient hasn’t had an opioid prescription in the past 12 months.

“We know that people who get over a week’s worth of medication on their first prescription are twice and sometimes even three times as likely to continue to use that medication a year later,” House District 11 Representative Jonathan Singer said.

Singer is one of the sponsors of Senate Bill 22 in the House. He said the bill was developed to address the opioid epidemic.

“When we talk to doctors who are addiction experts, they’re saying if we can stop this at the first prescription, and make sure there’s not seven, eight, or nine days worth of medication, when it could just be two or three days worth of opiates, that can solve the problem,” Singer said. “We can greatly reduce the likelihood of abuse and also reduce the likelihood that somebody is going to end up selling those on the black market.”

The bill is specifically addressing first prescriptions for patients with acute pain.

Before prescribing a refill, doctors would be required to check a statewide database which tracks opioid prescriptions before prescribing a refill. Right now, health care practitioners are allowed to check the database, but not required to.

“This will affect the doctor-patient relationship a little bit. For the first time in a long time, the legislatures will be telling doctors what they can and cannot prescribe in certain very specific situations,” Singer said.

The way the bill is currently written, patients who have chronic pain, cancer, or are in hospice would not be affected by the bill should it become law.