As I have written many times before, the opioid prescribing guidelines put forth by the Centers for Disease Control and prevention have been criticized for not being evidence-based. This has even caused the Food and Drug Administration to begin the process of developing its own set of guidelines.

In publishing the guidelines, the CDC emphasized they were meant to be suggestive, not “prescriptive,” pointing out that health care practitioners know their patients’ situations better than any regulators and should therefore individualize their prescribing to meet their patients’ unique needs. 

That has not prevented the majority of states from implementing opioid prescribing guidelines that place limits on the dose, amount, and length of time that doctors can prescribe opioids—usually restricting the dose of opioids to a maximum of 90 MME (morphine milligram equivalents) per day. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures at least 30 states have implemented such guidelines. These guidelines have caused many health care practitioners to return to the undertreatment of pain for which they were criticized in the 1980s and 90s. And it has driven many chronic pain patients to desperation as their doctors abruptly taper their pain medication or cut them off entirely.

The American Medical Association has gently criticized the misinterpretation and misapplication of the CDC guidelines in the past. Now two and a half years after the CDC published its guidelines, the AMA has taken a more adamant stand. This week, at the AMA’s interim meeting in Maryland, its House of Delegates resolved:

RESOLVED that our AMA affirms that some patients with acute or chronic pain can benefit from taking opioids at greater dosages than recommended by the CDC Guidelines for Prescribing Opioids for chronic pain and that such care may be medically necessary and appropriate. 

RESOLVED that our AMA advocate against the misapplication of the CDC Guidelines for Prescribing Opioids by pharmacists, health insurers, pharmacy benefit managers, legislatures, and governmental and private regulatory bodies in ways that prevent or limit access to opioid analgesia.

RESOLVED that our AMA advocate that no entity should use MME thresholds as anything more than guidance, and physicians should not be subject to professional discipline, loss of board certification, loss of clinical privileges, criminal prosecution, civil liability, or other penalties or practice limitations solely for prescribing opioids at a quantitative level above the MME thresholds found in the CDC Guidelines for Prescribing Opioids.

Sadly, the opiophobia-driven policy train left the station long ago. As an eternal optimist, my initial reaction is to think, “better late than never,” and to hope this new resolution will cause policymakers to reconsider their misguided policy. But the cynical voice inside me responds with a more negative cliché: “a day late and a dollar short.”