Articles

TASA ID: 13340

Physicians for Responsible Opioid Prescribing (PROP) is currently providing input to the U.S. Dept. of HHS to preserve the 2016 CDC Opioid Prescribing Guideline which is under some threat from the influence of the opioid pharmaceutical industry and some members of the pain community. This could also have positive implications for future legal cases for victims of opioid over-prescribing, especially in regard to the continued profit-driven malfeasance of these two sectors which have been largely responsible for the creation of the opioid epidemic. Will have more to say about this over the next few months.

TASA ID: 13340

This article originally appeared in The Rheumatologist, 2008 - https://www.the-rheumatologist.org/article/perils-of-pain-meds/ and has been granted permission to be republished on The TASA Group website.

Over the last decade, an expansion in the use of opioids has been advocated by certain pain specialists as well as pharmaceutical companies. In my opinion, this has occurred in the absence of valid data that support the claims that opioids can effectively and safely be extended beyond cancer to most patients with chronic non-cancer pain with a low risk of addiction. Such claims have subsequently been found to be inaccurate, and the original
statement about the low rate of addiction to a common oxycodone sustained-release formulation has been shown to be false (as recently admitted by pharmaceutical company executives as a result of a Federal indictment).

TASA ID: 4718

Two years ago, I was contacted by a Memphis lawyer (not John Grisham) asking if I would help him with a case.  He represented a manufacturer’s representative who had tirelessly worked for two years to place a Canadian company’s product into Walmart only to be fired shortly thereafter.  Not surprisingly, he was never paid a commission.  It was one of several similar stories my profession encounters.  

TASA ID: 273

Causal analysis is a surprisingly complex process that over the years has been subject to push and pulls from a wide variety of professional influences. When determining the actual cause of an accident or an incident, any number of stake holders would like to address the issue that “caused” the accident, whether to prevent a reoccurrence or, on the other side of the remedial spectrum, to punish the causal party.

TASA ID: 273

Capt. Terry Ogg published a thoughtful article on safety culture and training on LinkedIn. The title is “Why it's time to deep-six our current safety culture,” but within the article he provides an even better meme: The Whac-A-Mole Safety Game.