Advocacy through Legislation. Idea for Addressing the Issue

Advocacy through Legislation
Name
Institution
Advocacy through Legislation
Problem
Opioid addiction has become a national crisis in the United States in the recent past. The crisis is also very serious in the state of Virginia such that in 2016, opioid addiction was declared a public health emergency (Virginia Department of Health (VDH), 2019). The opioid addiction has affected many people, but the most vulnerable are people who suffer from chronic pain. Also, the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) (2016) reveals that young adults are affected most by this crisis because they mostly use opioids for non-medical reasons. As a result of this epidemic, there has been an increase in emergency department visits, blood-borne pathogen infections such as hepatitis C and deaths related to opioids addiction (VDH, 2019). Yet, despite being declared an emergency, opioid addiction in Virginia remains a challenge. According to the NIDA (2019), Virginia recorded an opioid-related death rate of 14.8 deaths per 100,000 persons in 2017 which was higher than the national rate of 14.6 deaths per 100,000 persons. It also revealed that since 2011, the deaths related to prescription opioids have not decreased, remaining at an average of 404 deaths every year. These statistics are alarming and more opioid-related deaths should be expected if the crisis is not averted. Further, if access to opioids is not restricted using stringent legal methods, the number of persons addicted to opioids will continue to be on the rise, worsening the current ramifications
Idea for Addressing the Issue
Statistics indicate that more people in Virginia State and the country as a whole are becoming more dependent on opioids. This is an indication that access to opioids has increased over the years. As a nurse, my idea is to advocate for the restriction of prescription opioids through legislation. Passing a law that limits the legal access to opioids by reducing opioid prescriptions for first-time users to about five days is the most viable approach to addressing this crisis because healthcare providers will be held liable in case they over-prescribe. According to the National Academies of Sciences (2017), many people gain access to prescription opioids because of “diversion via the filling of a prescription.” This occurs when patients obtain multiple prescriptions from negligent or inattentive healthcare providers. Thus, patients who have legal access to prescription opioids due to chronic pain obtain more opioids than necessary and eventually become addicted. Also, when healthcare providers knowingly or unknowingly over-prescribe, they increase the supply of opioids. The National Academies of Sciences (2017) reveals that one out of five people with legal opioid prescription share the opioids with other people. The legislation should also provide a jail term or penalties to providers who over-prescribe opioids.
Evidence-Based Findings
There is enough evidence indicating that healthcare providers have contributed to the current opioid epidemic in the country. Thus, limiting their ability to prescribe opioids, especially to first-time patients, is imperative in the fight against opioid addiction. This idea is first informed by an article by Shah, Hayes, and Martin (2017) which revealed that patients become addicted to opioids when the first prescription is supplied for more than five days. According to the report, continued use of opioids after the first five days may lead to a 50% probability that a patient will become dependent on opioids within 45 days. Also, the report indicates that as the number of opioid prescriptions in the first episode increases, so does the probability of addiction. Yet, over the last 15 years or so, the average number of days that healthcare providers prescribe opioids has increased by 33%, from approximately 13 to 17 days (Schuchat, Houry, & Guy, 2017). Even at 13 days, the likelihood of developing opioids dependency was high and an increase in the same only worsens the situation. This can explain why states such as Virginia are still experiencing a challenge with opioid addiction, despite various efforts to avert the crisis.
Second, opioid prescriptions directly from healthcare providers contribute to about 27% of long-term opioid dependency, according to Dineena and DuBois (2016). Thus, holding healthcare providers accountable in cases of opioid over-prescription can lead to a reduction of about 27% opioid addictions, which can be considered as progress in this fight. Such statistics and reports are the reasons why Arizona enacted a law that aims at decreasing the chances of dependency by observing a five-day limit while prescribing opioids for a first-time patient. Before this legislation, approximately 431 million pills were prescribed in Arizona in 2016, providing an opioid supply for more than two weeks for every Arizonan (azgovernor.gov, n.d.). This supply has since decreased, thanks to the legislation.
Stakeholder Support
Given the current state of addiction in Virginia, the first stakeholder to support this legislation would be the governor. The current governor of Virginia, Ralph Northam, stated in 2018 that addressing opioid addiction requires a means by which healthcare providers can be held accountable to avoid over-prescription (VDH, 2018). This makes him a suitable supporter of the p...