By: Karina Gonzalez
With the opioid epidemic in South Florida at crisis levels, there is an increasing demand on local hospital emergency departments for screening and evaluations of drug overdoses, considered a medical emergency. Addiction treatment law evolves with EMTALA updates. Many patients receiving substance abuse treatment in this community are coming from out-of-state. Many are young, under 35 years and a majority receive outpatient services. Overdoses are occurring more frequently as patients deliberately misuse opioid prescriptions such as Fentanyl or an illicit drugs such as heroin. If the patient possesses and or uses an illicit drug while in treatment, the policy in many facilities is to terminate treatment and discharge the patient. But if the patient has overdosed, the facility will place a call to 911 and that patient will end up with a visit to a local emergency department. A discharged patient will often continue using and end up in the emergency department, taken there by paramedics or some other individual.
Evolution of EMTALA
Local emergency departments now play a pivotal role in the next steps that an overdosed patient may take. Is the patient receiving their EMTALA rights (Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act), a federal law requiring anyone coming to a hospital emergency department to be screened and examined? If an emergency medical condition exists, treatment is provided to relieve or eliminate the emergency medical condition within the service capability of the hospital, a difficult task with substance abuse. Continue reading
