Newswise — Dr. Neel Mehta is the Medical Director of Pain Medicine at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center
Overdoses of opioid drugs, including powerful prescription painkillers, have killed more than 180,000 Americans over the past 15 years, and President Trump recently declared the opioid crisis a national emergency.
“With approximately 142 Americans dying every day, America is enduring a death toll equal to September 11th every three weeks,” says the interim report by the President's Commission on Combating Drug Addiction and the Opioid Crisis that recommended that the president declare a national emergency.
To combat the growing crisis, the report recommends: expanding drug treatment programs under Medicaid; increasing the use of medication-assisted treatments; encouraging the development of non-opioid pain relievers and directing local law enforcement across the nation to carry naloxone—a drug that rapidly reverses opiate overdose.
Dr. Mehta can speak to the practicality of these recommendations and share additional tactics that could help alleviate this growing crisis. He has also advocated for more comprehensive pain management training for healthcare providers that prescribe opioids, and can outline methods for improved physician-patient interactions when creating a plan to deal with pain. His team has achieved considerable success with using cutting edge, minimally invasive treatments for pain that prevent and reduce opioid usage.
Dr. Mehta is available for interviews.
To arrange an interview with Dr. Neel Mehta please call 212-821-0560 or email [email protected].
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