America’s Essential Hospitals, along with eight other organizations, sent a letter to the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) on Oct. 6, urging it to delay enforcement of some provisions in its final rule on disposal of controlled substances. The organizations are concerned that hospitals will be adversely affected by provisions requiring them to adopt new protocols by Oct. 9, 2014, for collecting and destroying controlled substances. These provisions are not readily compatible with employee and patient safety protocols and will require months of employee retraining, new technology, and redeployment of current staff or the addition of new staff. The rule allows 30 days for implementation, which the organizations feel is unreasonable given the complex requirements related to the disposal of controlled substances.
Hospitals that find they are unable to comply with the regulations in the final rule may apply for a waiver by submitting a written request to the DEA’s Office of Diversion Control. The letter should be directed to Joseph Rannazzisi, deputy assistant administrator of the Office of Diversion Control, and should specify that it is a request for a waiver of the provisions in the Sept. 9, 2014 final rule on disposal of controlled substances, which is applicable to your entity’s disposal of controlled substances and scheduled to go into effect Oct. 9, 2014.
Please contact Xiaoyi Huang, JD, director of policy, at xhuang@essentialhospitals.org or 202.585.0127, with questions.