Physician Protect Thyself: The Risks of Liberal Opioid Prescribing

The prescribing of opioids and other controlled substances presents significant legal and practice risks for healthcare providers. Liberal prescribing practices can lead to criminal liability, malpractice claims, medical board sanctions, and program exclusions, putting both patient safety and professional licensure at risk. Additionally, abrupt discontinuation of opioids poses serious concerns, including patient harm, withdrawal complications, and potential legal repercussions.

This discussion will explore the multifaceted risks associated with opioid prescribing, including legal consequences and regulatory scrutiny. We will also examine strategies that providers can implement immediately to enhance patient safety while minimizing medical-legal exposure. These best practices aim to support ethical, evidence-based prescribing and ensure compliance with evolving legal and professional standards.

In this pre-recorded webinar, speaker Don Stader, MD, FACEP, will discuss the legal and practice risks associated with liberal opioid and narcotic prescribing practices. 

 

Target Audience

Physicians

Advanced Practice Clinicians

Learning Objectives

  • Outline of the Compass program and schedule of learning modules. 

  • Discuss legal and practice risks associated with liberal opioid and controlled substance prescribing practices. 

  • Examine Criminal |Malpractice | Medical Board | Program Exclusion

  • Discuss the legal and practice risks associated with abrupt discontinuation of opioids. 

  • Introduce practice recommendations that can be implemented today to increase patient safety and reduce medical legal risk.

Course summary
Available credit: 
  • 1.00 AMA PRA Category 1 Credit™
Course opens: 
03/12/2025
Course expires: 
03/14/2028
Part of: 
Compass Opioid Stewardship Certificate Program
Rating: 
0

Don Stater, MD, FACAP, FASAM

Dr. Don Stader, is a board-certified emergency and addiction medicine physician, who works at Swedish Medical Center and Lincoln Health in Colorado. Don is also the founder and Executive Director of The Naloxone Project. He is the founder and past chair of Colorado ACEP's Opioid Task Force, the Editor-in-Chief of COACEP's 2017 Opioid Prescribing & Treatment Guidelines and the CO's CURE’s guidelines on pain control and opioid stewardship. Don served for over 2 years as the Senior Pain Management & Opioid Policy Physician Adviser for the Colorado Hospital Association and serves on multiple national and local committees addressing the opioid epidemic in Colorado and across the nation, he is the current chair of ACEP’s Pain & Addiction Management Section. He is the Medical Director of the Compass Opioid Stewardship Program, a nationwide initiative to improve pain control, prescribing habits, addiction treatment and opioid stewardship for primary care clinicians.

 

Accreditation: This activity has been planned and implemented in accordance with the accreditation requirements and policies of the Iowa Medical Society (IMS). Compass Healthcare Collaborative (Compass) is accredited by the IMS to provide continuing medical education for physicians.

Designation: The Compass Healthcare Collaborative (Compass) designates this live activity for a maximum of 1.0 AMA PRA Category 1 Credit(s)™. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.

Commercial Support: This Activity was developed without support from any ineligible company. *The ACCME defines ineligible companies as those whose primary business is producing, marketing, selling, re-selling, or distributing healthcare products used by or on patients. Note: The ACCME does not consider providers of clinical service directly to patients to be commercial interests – unless the provider of clinical services is owned, or controlled by, and ACCME defined ineligible company.

Disclosure: Compass adheres to the Standards for Integrity and Independence in Accredited Continuing Education. The content of this activity is not related to products or the business lines of an ACCME-defined ineligible company. Compass has identified, reviewed, and mitigated all conflicts of interest that speakers, authors, course directors, planners, peer reviewers, or relevant staff disclose prior to the delivery of any educational activity.

Available Credit

  • 1.00 AMA PRA Category 1 Credit™
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