Ohio injured workers fund battling painkillers

COLUMBUS (AP) — Nearly a third of the prescriptions that Ohio’s insurance fund for injured workers paid for last year were for powerful narcotics, part of a 37 percent increase in the use of such drugs — mainly highly addictive painkillers — the agency has seen among off-the-job employees over the past 10 years.

In addition, nearly a dollar of every $5 the agency pays out in medical benefits goes to cover prescription drugs, or $137 million last year, said John Hanna, pharmacy director at the Ohio Bureau of Workers’ Compensation.

Hanna told bureau directors Thursday the agency is part of the problem when it comes to the state’s prescription painkiller epidemic. He said in a follow-up interview that some of the agency’s patients are “shipwrecks” who have been mistreated by prescribing physicians.

Hanna said the agency has 7,000 injured workers taking doses of painkillers, sometimes called opiates, at levels that meet the definition for being physically dependent on the drug.