EAST LONGMEADOW – Theresa Riethle, physician assistant program director at Bay Path University, was recently chosen to participate in an initiative put forth by Gov. Charlie Baker to create a structured guide for health professionals prescribing opioids.

Riethle told Reminder Publications every physician assistant director at colleges and universities throughout the Commonwealth was contacted by a representative of the Massachusetts Association of Physician Assistants (MAPA) to be included in the initiative.

“MAPA was tasked by the Governor’s Office with creating competencies for proper prescribing of opioids so that we could all have consistent objectives that we would teach in our programs,” she explained.

She added the committee consists of physician assistant program directors and members of the Massachusetts Department of Public Health. The committee developed a list of objectives related to prescribing opioids and plans to add them to the program curriculums at colleges across the state.  

“I think it’s about responsible prescribing,” she noted. “There are people that have true pain. If you break a leg, you might need something for pain … Does that mean you get a prescription for 50 pills? No. But maybe you get 12 and you augment it with Motrin and ice and you’re going to see the patient back anyway and you’re going to reassess.”

Riethle said she’s already seen a change in the culture of prescribing opioids with her students.

“We’ve already been infusing the information and so we’ll do a case, for example, they give everyone Tylenol and we’ll say, ‘Do you think they have pain?’ And they’re already so worried about prescribing a narcotic. So, we have to do the right thing to teach them the balance of when is it appropriate and what does that dosing look like.”

Riethle said there is also a new prescription-monitoring program for Massachusetts, which she believes would help all health professionals who prescribe medication.

“What the prescription monitoring program does is it allows you to look up patients and see if they’ve had multiple prescriptions for a narcotic recently,” she explained. “The old system was just cumbersome and didn’t always work.”

The new program requires health professionals to examine the patient’s prescription history when prescribing a narcotic, she noted.

“We also have the ability now with the new system to connect to the surrounding states, which is huge,” Riethle said.

She said she believes the next generation of physician assistants needs to be prepared better than the previous generation regarding the opioid epidemic.

Riethle added 80 percent of Bay Path’s graduates start working locally after graduation.