In a Feb. 20 letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi, the organizations wrote that the proposed regulations would “limit patient access through requirements that a clinician provide in-person care rather than creating guardrails that more narrowly address the real-world risks of controlled substance diversion.”
In the last days of the Biden administration, the Drug Enforcement Administration and HHS proposed rules to establish a three-tiered system for prescribing controlled substances via telehealth.
The first tier would allow physicians and other qualified clinicians to prescribe schedule III and IV drugs via telehealth. The second would allow only specialized providers, including psychiatrists, to prescribe schedule II drugs through telehealth.
The third tier would apply to telehealth platforms. The DEA proposed requiring platforms to receive approval to prescribe controlled substances.
In the letter, the organizations urged Ms. Bondi to advocate for “patients and practitioners to continue to offer care that relies on the prescribing of a controlled substance before the end of 2025.”
Current flexibilities allowing providers to prescribe controlled substances through telehealth are set to expire at the end of 2025.
The letter was led by the Alliance for Connected Care, a trade association advocating for telehealth access. It was signed by multiple health systems, including St. Louis-based Ascension. Several behavioral telehealth platforms, including Amwell and Talkiatry, also signed the letter.