Emergency department physicians at New Jersey’s St. Joseph’s Hospital have reduced opioid use on their ward by 58%. How? By holding themselves accountable, educating themselves about alternative methods of pain management and making those alternatives available to their patients. But it’s still an uphill battle.

“The insurance companies don’t embrace all the alternative treatments and instead would rather frequently have us prescribe opioids because they tend to be inexpensive and readily available,” ED chair Dr. Mark Rosenberg told NPR’s Hansi Lo Wang. So, she reported, “A few times, doctors had to work with pharmacists to find more affordable alternatives to the alternatives.”

Full story here.