This morning, Congresswoman Annie Kuster (NH-02) introduced bipartisan legislation to help address pain management for veterans dealing with chronic pain issues, including those who are dependent on opioids. Kuster has served on the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee since taking office, and as co-founder and chair of the Bipartisan Task Force to Combat the Heroin Epidemic, she is deeply committed to ensuring veteran pain is treated safely and effectively, and that veteran addiction is being addressed without putting those receiving care at risk.  Congressman Mike Coffman (CO-06) is the lead Republican sponsor of the legislation.

The Helping Our Veterans with Chronic Pain and Opioid Addiction Act of 2016 would create a pilot program in five states to examine pain management practices and develop new techniques for treating pain. These pilot programs will help local VAs cut down on opioid overprescribing and reduce veteran addiction, while continuing to provide adequate pain management. The pilot programs will be launched in states that are considered high-need, such as New Hampshire.

“As the co-chair of the Bipartisan Task Force to Combat the Heroin Epidemic, I’ve heard far too many stories of veterans dealing with chronic pain issues who are not offered alternative pain management methods as part of their treatment,” said Congresswoman Annie Kuster. “While chronic pain cannot be taken lightly, it is important that VA doctors are prescribing with care, and are working to find the right balance for their prescriptions. What’s more, we’ve seen a number of innovative new approaches to treating pain, particularly at the White River Junction VA Medical Center in Vermont, and patients should be offered these options in addition to opioids. The pilot programs created by this bill will provide crucial evidence-based research that will benefit every American community working to stop the opioid epidemic. I urge my colleagues to immediately pass this bill into law.”

This bill was partially inspired by the work of Dr. Julie Franklin, a White River Junction VA Medical Center doctor who treats New Hampshire veterans.  Dr. Franklin has taken an innovative approach to pain management, and through her work and research she has been able to reduce the number of her patients relying on opioids by nearly 50 percent.  Kuster has met with Dr. Franklin multiple times in her capacity as a member of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee and the co-chair of the Bipartisan Task Force to Combat the Heroin Epidemic.

“Through many months of holding hearings and speaking to VA officials, it appears that the first line of treatment for pain management is to prescribe opioids,” said Rep. Mike Coffman, Chairman of the House Veterans’ Affairs Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations. “This legislation is an important step to ensure that our nation's veterans receive the proper pain management treatments through the VA, while also ensuring that opioids are not overprescribed."

In addition to creating five pilot programs, the bill Kuster introduced today will instruct the VA to conduct an assessment of its ability to provide services related to substance use disorder and manage chronic pain without the long-term use of opioids. The VA will also be required to learn more about evidence-based methods for safely reducing dose and duration of opioids, and to assess how well the VA is currently ensuring veterans in need of opioid dependency treatment are placed in treatment programs.  The VA would also assess the ability of non-VA providers to supplement that care.

Congresswoman Kuster has served on the U.S. House Veterans’ Affairs Committee (HVAC) since taking office in 2013, and she is the current Ranking Member of the HVAC Committee on Oversight and Investigations. She has long advocated for increased research into new pain management practices, particularly for veterans dealing with chronic pain, in order to cut down on addiction among the veteran community. Earlier this year, she and Congressman Coffman, Chair of the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee, held a field hearing in New Hampshire to hear directly from local physicians, the VA, and community stakeholders about best practices for the management of veteran pain issues.  In addition, Kuster was instrumental in the passage of the Comprehensive Addiction and Recovery Act (CARA) in the House, legislation to holistically address the opioid epidemic.

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