Telehealth prescribing of controlled drugs extended through 2025
Extension of other PHE waivers for telehealth and remote monitoring awaits action by Congress before the end of this year.
Photo: Kilito Chan/Getty Images
For the third time, the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Department of Health and Human Services has extended telemedicine flexibilities for the prescribing of controlled medications and certain narcotic drugs.
The extension runs through December 31, 2025.
The American Telemedicine Association, telepsychiatry practices and others have supported the continuation of these prescriptions to be available without the necessity of an in-person visit.
Practitioners can prescribe schedule II-V controlled medications and schedule III-V narcotic controlled medications for withdrawal management treatment of opioid use disorder, via audio-only telemedicine encounters.
WHY THIS MATTERS
Without the extension in the Third Temporary Extension of COVID-19 Telemedicine Flexibilities for Prescription of Controlled Medications, these prescribing flexibilities would have ended at the end of this year.
During the COVID-19 public health emergency, HHS and the DEA granted temporary exceptions to the Ryan Haight Act to allow for remote prescribing. The Ryan Haight Online Pharmacy Consumer Protection Act of 2008 stipulated that controlled medications could only be prescribed after conducting an in-person evaluation of that patient.
To prevent lapses in care during the pandemic, these exceptions allowed for the prescribing of controlled medications through telemedicine encounters even without an in-person medical evaluation of the patient.
In 2023, after the DEA received more than 38,000 comments and held two days of public listening sessions, the DEA and HHS extended current telemedicine flexibilities through the end of 2024.
This was the second extension granted by the DEA. The first was to expire on November 11, 2023.
THE LARGER TREND
The extension of other PHE waivers for telehealth and remote monitoring awaits action by Congress before the end of this year.
The American Hospital Association supports action on both.
The $1.7 trillion Consolidated Appropriations Act President Joe Biden signed into law in December 2022 included an extension of telehealth waivers and the Acute Hospital Care at Home individual waiver.
The Acute Hospital Care at Home initiative allows hospitals to expand their capacity to provide inpatient care in an individual's home.
Waivers allowed individuals with Medicare to have access to telehealth services from their homes, without the geographic or location limits that applied prior to the PHE. It allowed providers to remotely provide care in place of an in-person office visit.
Email the writer: SMorse@himss.org
