Low-value Care

Report: Women at immigration detention center pressured into unneeded surgeries

Abstract: Women held in a South Georgia immigration detention center were referred to a gynecologist for problems unrelated to their reproductive health and were pressured to undergo unnecessary surgeries, according to a group of medical experts reviewing their complaints.

Publication: Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Date Published: October 23, 2020

Author(s): Jeremy Redmon and Alan Judd

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To eliminate medication overload, serious cultural, educational, and policy changes are needed. This action plan offers recommendations for policymakers, health care institutions, clinicians, and patients across five key categories to reduce harm from multiple medication use. Suggested Citation: Eliminating medication overload: A national action plan. Working Group on Medication Overload. Brookline, MA: The Lown Institute, 2020. DOI: https://doi.org/10.46241/LI.YLBW4885

Pharmaceutical marketing is a significant factor in the growing public health crisis of medication overload, which puts millions of older adults at risk of preventable harm and premature death. This issue brief provides recommendations to reduce pharmaceutical industry influence by limiting pharma sales rep visits to clinicians and direct-to-consumer advertising.

This issue brief provides recommendations for clinical practice guidelines and electronic health records that would give clinicians the information they need to appropriately prescribe and deprescribe.