STAND

STAND. COM. REP. 3019

Honolulu, Hawaii

, 2004

RE: H.B. No. 1839

H.D. 2

S.D. 1

Honorable Robert Bunda

President of the Senate

Twenty-Second State Legislature

Regular Session of 2004

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committees on Health and Commerce, Consumer Protection and Housing, to which was referred H.B. No. 1839, H.D. 2, entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO PAIN PATIENT'S BILL OF RIGHTS,"

beg leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to enact a pain patient's bill of rights to authorize doctors to prescribe medically necessary doses of a controlled substance to treat intractable pain.

Specifically, this measure:

(1) Empowers a patient suffering from chronic intractable pain with options; and

(2) Allows the patient's physician to refuse to prescribe opiate medication, but requires the patient's physician to inform the patient of other doctors who use opiates to treat chronic intractable pain.

Testimony in support of this measure was received from Healthcare Association of Hawaii, Hawaii Medical Association, Hospice Hawaii, Policy Advisory Board for Elderly Affairs, Hawaii Family Forum, and the Roman Catholic Church in the State of Hawaii. Testimony in opposition was received from Compassion in Dying of Hawaii.

Your Committees find that protecting physicians in their role to relieve a patient's pain is an important step towards significant progress in treatments relative to end-of-life care, especially for cancer patients. Furthermore, this measure improves Hawaii's pain policies by giving patients suffering from intractable pain the right to receive appropriate medication to relieve the pain.

Your Committees have amended this measure by:

(1) Adding language from S.B. No. 2670, S.D. 2, which authorizes the Board of Medical Examiners to establish pain management guidelines for physicians and osteopathic physicians; and

(2) Changing the effective date to July 1, 2004.

As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Health and Commerce, Consumer Protection and Housing that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 1839, H.D. 2, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 1839, H.D. 2, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Health and Commerce, Consumer Protection and Housing,

____________________________ RON MENOR, Chair		____________________________ ROSALYN H. BAKER, Chair