- The Northern Nye County Hospital District says two collaborations will help expand services in that area. (ktvn.com)
It says that the Regional Emergency Medical Services Authority (REMSA) and Renown Health have both entered into agreements with the Northern Nye County Hospital District for a phased expansion of services over the next year...“The Northern Nye County Hospital District is proud to collaborate with REMSA and Renown to expand on the much-needed services for the thousands of residents in central Nevada,” said Justin Zimmerman, a Northern Nye County Hospital District Board Trustee. “Together, we are innovating rural healthcare delivery, creating new ways for residents to access medical care while preserving their local, independent way of life.”...Future phases of the REMSA expansion will include locally-based, 24/7 Community Paramedics, as well as community wellness and public education initiatives...Renown, in partnership with the Northern Nye County Hospital District, will be expanding on the care already being provided to residents since it opened the medical group in June 2016 at the former Nye Regional Medical Center, 825 S. Main Street...
- Nevada AG Announces Formation of Statewide Partnership on Opioid Crisis (ktvn.com)
Nevada Attorney General Adam Paul Laxalt has announced the formation of a Statewide Partnership on the Opioid Crisis. The Working Group’s first meeting will take place Thursday, and will include members from local and federal law enforcement, prosecutors, experts in the medical field, elected officials, and judicial and educational representatives...The primary function of the statewide partnership is to make recommendations to the Attorney General’s Office and Nevada’s Statewide Opioid Coordinator on best practices for data sharing to combat the opioid crisis. The AG says this remains a critical gap in Nevada’s response to the crisis...
- Nevada State Board of Pharmacy News January 2018 (bop.nv.gov)
- Reappointment of Jason Penrod
- A New Era for Compounding Inspections
- Senate Bill 59 Makes Changes in Reporting to the Nevada PMP
- PMP Data Submission Accuracy Data
National Pharmacy Compliance News First Quarter 2018
- FDA Draft Guidance Addresses Delayed Enforcement of DSCSA Requirements for Product Identifiers
- Amount of Prescribed Opioids Remains High, Reports CDC
- AMA Opioid Task Force Encourages Co-Prescribing Naloxone to At-Risk Patients
- Opioid Addiction Medications Should Not Be Withheld From Patients Taking Benzodiazepines or CNS Depressants
- New Study Shows Substantial Variation in the Availability of Pharmacies Across the Country
- Consent Decree Entered Against Outsourcing Facility Isomeric Pharmacy Solutions
- FDA Issues Warning on Alcohol Pads or Benzalkonium Chloride Antiseptic Towelettes Made by Foshan
- Follow the Money: Democrats see fewer contributions from Big Pharma in 2017 (thenevadaindependent.com)
The pharmaceutical industry largely snubbed Democrats when it came to doling out campaign contributions last year after the Democrat-controlled Legislature passed a bill to increase drug-pricing transparency in June...Only four Democrats — two members of Assembly leadership and the chairs of the Assembly and Senate health committees — received any contributions from the industry last year while 19 received industry contributions in 2016. By contrast, 19 Republican lawmakers and candidates and four Republican PACs or committees received donations from pharmaceutical companies in 2017, roughly comparable to 2016 trends...The $17,000 in pharmaceutical donations Democrats received represented about 1 percent of the more than $1.4 million the industry spent in Nevada in 2017. Republicans received 67 percent of the industry’s contributions, while the remaining 32 percent went toward funding the industry’s opposition, through the Healthy Nevada PAC, to the insulin pricing transparency bill sponsored by Democratic Sen. Yvanna Cancela in 2017.
TOP 10 PHARMA MONEY RECIPIENTS:
- Republican State Leadership Committee: $914,000
- Attorney General candidate Wes Duncan: $8,500
- Assembly Speaker Jason Frierson: $8,250
- Sen. Ben Kieckhefer: $6,500 (including $1,250 to his PAC)
- Sen. Joe Hardy: $6,250 (including $1,250 to his PAC)
- Assemblyman James Oscarson: $5,000
- Gubernatorial candidate and Attorney General Adam Laxalt: $3,500
- Assemblyman Mike Sprinkle, 2017 chair of the Assembly health committee: $3,250
- Assemblyman Chris Edwards: $3,000
- Assembly Minority Leader Jim Wheeler: $2,850
- Governor Sandoval Announces Second Meeting of Opioid Task Force (ktvn.com)‘This is an issue of rural prosperity’: Nevada roundtable spotlights opioid epidemic in small communities (lasvegassun.com)
Governor Brian Sandoval announced...that the second meeting of his Opioid State Action Accountability Task Force will take place April 18th in Carson City...The 1 p.m. meeting will be held in the Old Assembly Chambers at the state Capitol Building...the Task Force will hear a status report of crosscutting initiatives and status reports on track one – prescriber education and guidelines; track two – treatment options and third-party payers; track three – data collection and intelligence sharing; and track four – criminal justice investigations...“This Task Force has the specific task of reviewing the policies and programs that have been put into place to address the opioid epidemic in our state,” Sandoval added. “I am looking forward to hearing reports on the progress being made to combat this epidemic.”...
- Clarifying regulations could address some doctor concerns with new opioid law (thenevadaindependent.com)Information Regarding AB 474 (bop.nv.gov)Nevada Prescription Drug Abuse Prevention Act is Effective Jan. 1, 2018 (gov.nv.gov)
It’s been nearly two months since a law requiring doctors to take additional steps before writing prescriptions for opioids went into effect, though some of the questions and concerns raised by doctors about the law are only now just starting to be answered...A subcommittee formed specifically to address concerns related to the implementation of the law grappled with some of the areas of uncertainty at a recent meeting with the goal of ultimately clarifying the exact steps doctors must take when writing a prescription for painkillers and figuring out what punishment they should face should they fail to do so. But to what extent that clarification can or should be codified into state regulations will be up to the Board of Pharmacy, which will discuss the matter at a meeting early next month...Though the law, AB474, applies to any prescriber of opioids — from advanced practice registered nurses to dentists — most of the concerns about the law have come from medical doctors, who have lamented the extra time obtaining an informed consent and making a “good faith effort” to obtain a patient’s medical records. Some have even said they won’t write any more prescriptions for painkillers in response to the law and will direct patients instead to pain doctors...The Board of Medical Examiners is responsible for creating any disciplinary regulations they deem appropriate, but the law leaves any other clarifying regulations up to the Board of Pharmacy.
- Nevada takes steps toward leaving federal healthcare.gov (ktvn.com)
Nevada is taking steps toward leaving the federal healthcare.gov and setting up a separate exchange operated by the state...the Legislative Interim Finance Committee...authorized state officials to spend $1 million to prepare a request for proposals and find a private provider...Heather Korbulic, executive director of the state system, says changes are needed because healthcare.gov is steadily raising the rates it charges states that link their front-end systems to the federal exchange...Korbulic says the federal rate increases by 2019 will leave the state with almost nothing to run the front-end system...Nevada tied its state exchange to the site after...using Xerox as a contractor failed, but Korbulic says several vendors now have proven systems.
- Nevada counties ranked healthiest to least (kolotv.com)Find out how healthy your county is and explore factors that drive your health (countyhealthrankings.org)
Just how healthy is our community? It's an important question for all of us and the latest answer was delivered...at a meeting in the county commission chambers...The study--the 2018 County Health Rankings Report from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation--is in a way a county-by-county report card, of the nation's health...Douglas and Pershing counties, for instance, topped the list as the healthiest. Mineral and Nye, the least. That apparently came as little surprise to those who work in public health. Washoe, by the way, slipped in this latest survey from fourth to ninth..."We have an increased number of people who say they are in poor health."...The survey measured a list of factors including socioeconomic factors such as graduation rates, health insurance, teen births, income inequality...There was one factor, however, that played a role in a number of ways--our housing crunch...One other factor jumped out of the data: deaths related to DUI accidents.
- Nevada breaks with UNLV health clinic over patient conditions (reviewjournal.com)
Nevada health officials confirmed...they cut ties with UNLV’s mental health clinic, after...the university continued placing mentally ill clients in an unlicensed home previously closed by the state because of filthy conditions...“We weren’t satisfied with their response in terms of assurance that people were placed in homes that were credentialed and that were safe,” said Richard Whitley, director at the Nevada Department of Health and Human Services. “I did not see a sense of urgency demonstrated by (Mojave Mental Health) to ensure that people were placed in appropriate environments.”...The contract termination comes after...Mojave placed at least seven men with severe mental illness inside an unlicensed home at 724 N. Ninth Street a year after the state shut it down. The men were living in tiny rooms filled with trash, broken glass, rodents, expired medication and rotten food. The state shut down the home again this month...On Feb. 9 the state served Mojave, a subsidiary of the UNLV School of Medicine, a 30-day termination notice. The state will relocate Mojave patients who are living in noncertified homes...Roughly 210 patients will be affected, though it’s unclear how many will have to move...
- Community health centers in desperate need of being re-funded (nevadaappeal.com)
Sierra Nevada Health Center is one of Carson City's two federally-qualified health care centers that were hoping for renewed funding at the beginning of this month, but are instead still waiting on Congress to extend the Community Health Centers Fund program that expired on Sept. 30, 2016...Nevada's six federally-qualified health care centers provide care to around 89,000 patients across the state. Sierra Nevada Health Center and Carson City School-based Health Center provide care to Carson City and Carson Valley residents and are hanging in a balance after the deadline to extend the funding passed...Nevada's health centers are among more than 1,300 community health centers across the U.S. that receive funding from the CHCF program. Today, Nevada's health centers employ more than 60 medical professionals...Earlier this month, Nevada Health Centers CEO and board chairs sent a letter to Nevada's congressional delegation to encourage action on funding for community health centers...addressed to Republican Sen. Dean Heller, Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, Democratic Rep. Dina Titus, Republican Rep. Mark Amodei, Democratic Rep. Jacky Rosen and Democratic Rep. Ruben Kihuen, the CEO and board chairs asked for unity between political parties and a solution to health care funding...The letter encourages Nevada congressional members "to develop a long-term, fiscally responsible funding plan that ensures the success of our country's greatest public health asset."