The MMA staff has posted the Annual Report of the Legislative Committee, a summary PowerPoint presentation, and other advocacy resources on the MMA web site here.

This week, we'll highlight a bill that has generated several calls to MMA's attorneys for interpretive guidance.  It is L.D. 479, An Act to Inform Patients of the Dangers of Addicting Opioids (P.L. 2017, Chapter 186).  This bill requires health care entities employing prescribers of opioid medications to develop an opioid prescribing policy that includes risk assessment, informed consent, and counseling on the risk of opioid use by January 1, 2018.  This bill originally would have required a practitioner to follow specific steps to obtain informed consent for each patient encounter, something MMA regularly opposes at the legislature. We object to these well-intended proposals because of the compliance challenges presented by many different legislative requirements for informed consent for different procedures or conditions.

If you have questions about compliance with this or other laws recently enacted by the Maine legislature, please contact Andrew MacLean, Deputy EVP & General Counsel (amaclean@mainemed.com) or Peter Michaud, Associate General Counsel (pmichaud@mainemed.com).