Cigna asks medical practices to sign opioid pledge with goal of dropping usage by 25 percent

Cigna is asking medical practices to sign a pledge and join its commitment to lowering  customers' opioid use by 25 percent over the next three years.

Initially, Cigna is asking the 160 large medical groups participating in Cigna Collaborative Care to adopt the pledge.

Participants will be asked to commit to taking a specific action to reduce opioid use, while improving pain management and substance use treatment where appropriate.

Progress will be tracked in quarterly reviews of Cigna Collaborative Care arrangements.

[Also: Children, toddlers flood hospital emergency rooms due to opioid poisoning, study finds]

Medical groups making this commitment will have access to a public database of opioid quality improvement initiatives.

Using its claims data and analytics, Cigna will alert these doctors when their opioid prescribing patterns are not consistent with Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines.

The company will also provide resources to physicians so they can improve care for patients taking opioids for long periods of time, including referrals into chronic pain management or substance use disorder treatment programs.

The Cigna pledge dovetails with the U.S. Surgeon General's "Turn the Tide" pledge and the CDC's opioid prescribing guidelines.

[Also: Opioid-related spending by health insurers spikes more than 1,300 percent]

"Adopting this pledge is an opportunity to shine a light on one of the biggest crises we face in healthcare today and enables us to work collaboratively with our clinical partners to find effective solutions," said Dick Salmon, M.D., Cigna's vice president and national medical executive for performance measurement and improvement. "It's not enough to just sign the pledge. We're counting on these groups to commit to taking specific actions and we will discuss results as part of our ongoing quality reviews."

Several medical groups have already agreed to sign the pledge and have committed to undertaking a specific quality initiative to implement it, Cigna said.

The goal is to have most of them signed up by the end of the year with the remaining commitments coming in early 2017.

Cigna also plans to roll out the pledge more broadly next year to other doctors that participate in its networks.

[Also: HHS awards $53 million to tackle opioid crisis]

Cigna's pledge asks medical groups to learn alternative ways to treat pain safely and effectively, screen patients for opioid use disorder, provide or connect patients to evidence-based treatment, and talk about and treat substance use disorder as a chronic illness, not a moral failing.

Physicians will also be expected to reduce opioid prescriptions by prescribing alternative therapies when they are available.

"The resources we share with our provider partners will benefit all of their patients, not just those who are Cigna customers," Salmon said. "Cigna is committed to reducing the burden of substance use disorders for all Americans."

Twitter: @SusanJMorse