Halting a Crisis: Safe Prescribing

This article is the fifth in a series about the epidemic of opioid addiction and how NEOMED is training future physicians and pharmacists to help.

Ohio Medicine, the official publication of the Ohio State Medical Association (OSMA), features NEOMED as a success story in an article on the Smart Rx® prescriber training program. The article appears in Issue 3, 2016.

OSMA developed the one-hour, online interactive program to teach prescribers about Ohio’s opioid rules and regulations, as well as to educate them about best practices in prescribing opioids and non-pharmacological options for treating pain.

Lisa N. Weiss, M.D., associate professor of family and community medicine at NEOMED, added Smart Rx® to the University’s College of Medicine curriculum this year to supplement students’ training. She said that nearly all of NEOMED’s third-year medicine students had completed the program, which will help them identify prescription misuse and opioid addiction.

“Because of NEOMED’s successful use of Smart Rx® other Ohio medical schools are now reviewing the program for inclusion into their curriculum. And some Ohio health systems are looking to include Smart Rx® as part of the onboarding process for newly hired medical residents,’’ wrote Bill Fankhauser, OSMA associate director of Residents/Student Engagement.