PAINWeekEnd in Charlotte, North Carolina, Offers CE/CME Education to Meet the Challenges of Opioid Prescribing Regulation

MONTCLAIR, N.J., April 1, 2019 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- PAINWeekEnd on April 27 at the Westin Charlotte, 601 S. College St., in North Carolina, will be a timely full day program providing busy clinicians and allied healthcare practitioners with 6.0 hours of relevant, practical instruction in the management of chronic pain.

The North Carolina Opioid Action Plan, introduced in 2017 by the state's Department of Health and Human Services is a multipronged initiative to combat the crisis of abuse, diversion, and fatalities from prescription and illicit opioids. The Department publishes metrics on the performance of the plan each quarter, the latest of which show a decrease from baseline (Q4 2016) in distribution of prescription opioids, but a still increasing total of opioid related deaths. The percent of these involving illicit opioids jumped from 58.7% to 85.5%. Community engagement in naloxone administration administrations increased, as did the number of buprenorphine prescriptions dispensed.1 Taken together, the Department asserts on its website that "These metrics show the state beginning to see success in its efforts to combat the opioid crisis. The oversupply of prescription opioids is being reduced and access to treatment and recovery services has increased." As regulatory efforts continue to steer patients and practitioners away from opioid therapy for pain, there has been a corresponding increase in interest in other treatment modalities, including nonprescription analgesics. At PAINWeekEnd Charlotte, Alexandra McPherson, PharmD, MPH, will present her course The 411 on Nonprescription Analgesics: When to Hold 'Em, When to Fold 'Em, about which she commented, "Patients frequently opt to use a nonprescription analgesic to self-treat a painful complaint, yet often do not have all the facts, such as potential exclusions to self-treatment or how to select the best analgesic from a sea of countless options. In this session, we'll investigate the mechanism of action, indications, adverse effects, and precautions of oral and topical nonprescription analgesics, along with key patient counseling points when recommending a nonprescription analgesic." Dr. McPherson will also present 3's Company: COX-2 Inhibitors, Medicinal Marijuana, and Opioid Prescribing.

Other courses to be offered at PAINWeekEnd Charlotte include Year of the Locusts: The CDC Guidelines Impact on Practitioners and Patients; Pain Pathways Made Simple; Migraines: A to Z; and Clinical Pearls: Unraveling the Secrets of Imaging Studies. Commercially supported activities—addressing a range of product, disease state, and medical information topics—will also be presented.

For more information about this or other regional conferences, and to register for $129, go to the https://www.painweek.org/conferences/painweekend/charlotte-nc-2019-conference website. BONUS: PAINWeekEnd registrants may register for the 2019 PAINWeek National Conference, September 3-7, in Las Vegas, for $200 off the regular online published price.

PAINWeekEnd is provided by Global Education Group. About Global Education Group:

Global Education Group focuses on producing partnership-based CME for healthcare practitioners. The Global team works with a select group of medical education companies, associations, academic institutions and healthcare facilities to develop and accredit live healthcare conferences and workshops as well as online activities. With each partnership or joint providership, Global brings accreditation expertise, project management excellence and grant funding intelligence. Based in Littleton, Colo., Global has accreditation with commendation from the ACCME. Global also holds accreditations to offer continuing education for nurses, nurse practitioners, pharmacists, dietitians, dentists and psychologists. Global is a division of Ultimate Medical Academy.

1.    Source: North Carolina Opioid Action Plan Quarterly Metrics https://files.nc.gov/ncdhhs/NC-Opioid-Action-Plan-Metrics-Jan-2019.pdf

SOURCE PAINWeekEnd

Related Links

https://www.painweek.org/