Marijuana testing stays in Ind. clinic bill
March 13, 2008
Courier-Journal
INDIANAPOLIS — Methadone clinics would be more strictly regulated and patients would undergo marijuana testing under legislation the Indiana House voted today to send to Gov. Mitch Daniels.
Rep. Steve Stemler, the bill’s sponsor, said the drug testing provisions could reduce the number of patients at the Southern Indiana Treatment Center in Clark County and at other methadone clinics located along the state’s borders.
He said many patients leave their home states — where marijuana testing is required — to come to Indiana’s clinics.
“This will make a huge impact,” said Stemler, D-Jeffersonville. “I feel confident that will happen.”
The Clark County clinic is the state’s second largest, serving nearly 2,000 patients in 2005. About two-thirds of those patients came from Kentucky.
In all, Indiana’s methadone clinics serve more than 10,000 patients annually with more than half coming from other states.
The final version of Senate Bill 157, which passed the House 89-0, does not include an earlier amendment that would have required the clinic’s patients to have a designated driver after their appointments.
Stemler had sought the requirement, saying that the federal Food and Drug Administration puts methadone — which is used to treat addictions to heroin, OxyContin and other drugs — in the same classification as those medicines used for outpatient surgeries or procedures.
In those cases, hospitals or medical centers require designated drivers.
But Stemler said today that the proposal proved too controversial and was take out of the bill. | 
