Senate Bill 23-144 Summary

• Establishes legal protections for healthcare providers (physicians, physician assistants, and advanced practice registered nurses) prescribing Schedule II-V controlled substances for chronic pain treatment when patient diagnosis and medical necessity are documented.

• Prohibits disciplinary action against providers for prescribing dosages that exceed morphine milligram equivalent (MME) recommendations or state/federal opioid prescribing guidelines when treating stable, compliant chronic pain patients without serious harm.

• Prevents providers from being required to taper patients' pain medication dosages solely to meet predetermined MME thresholds if the patient is stable, compliant, and not experiencing serious harm from current medication levels.

• Prohibits pharmacies, pharmacy benefit managers, carriers, and healthcare practices from having blanket policies that refuse to fill or prescribe opioid prescriptions based solely on exceeding MME dosage thresholds.

• Excludes from protection: treatment of substance use disorders, prescriptions known to be for non-therapeutic or drug diversion purposes, prescriptions for life termination, and controlled substances not FDA-approved for pain relief.