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Issues in long-term opioid therapy: unmet needs, risks, and solutions.

ABSTRACT: Both chronic pain and prescription opioid abuse are prevalent and exact a high toll on patients, physicians, and society. Health care professionals must balance aggressive treatment of chronic pain with the need to minimize the risks of opioid abuse, misuse, and diversion. A thorough, ongoing assessment can help fashion a multimodal therapeutic plan, stratify patients by risk, and identify those who may exhibit aberrant behaviors after receiving opioid therapy. Appropriate safeguards (eg, urine drug screens, pill counts) may be used when necessary. Because not all aberrant behaviors have the same origins or implications, physicians must consider a differential diagnosis and tailor therapy accordingly. Opioid formulations designed to deter and resist abuse are currently in late-stage clinical development and address some but not all aspects of inappropriate opioid use. By incorporating physical and pharmacological barriers to obtaining the euphoric effects of opioids, these novel formulations may minimize problematic opioid use. The formulations use a variety of strategies, for example, combining opioids with naltrexone or niacin or incorporating the opioid in a high-viscosity matrix designed to resist physical and chemical extraction. Nonopioid medications as well as cognitive, behavioral, and interventional techniques should be considered for all patients with chronic pain, particularly for those who are unable to safely take their opioids in a structured fashion. The aim of this article was to help physicians prescribe opioid medications safely and successfully to patients who need them. A PubMed literature search was conducted using the keywords risk management, assessment, aberrant behavior, addiction, prescription abuse, and abuse-deterrent.

SUBMITTER: Passik SD

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2704131 | biostudies-other | 2009 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-other

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Issues in long-term opioid therapy: unmet needs, risks, and solutions.

Passik Steven D SD

Mayo Clinic proceedings 20090701 7

Both chronic pain and prescription opioid abuse are prevalent and exact a high toll on patients, physicians, and society. Health care professionals must balance aggressive treatment of chronic pain with the need to minimize the risks of opioid abuse, misuse, and diversion. A thorough, ongoing assessment can help fashion a multimodal therapeutic plan, stratify patients by risk, and identify those who may exhibit aberrant behaviors after receiving opioid therapy. Appropriate safeguards (eg, urine ...[more]

PMID: 19567713

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Project description:ImportanceAttempts to discontinue opioid therapy to reduce the risk of overdose and adhere to prescribing guidelines may lead patients to be exposed to variability in opioid dosing. Such dose variability may increase the risk of opioid overdose even if therapy discontinuation is associated with a reduction in risk.ObjectiveTo examine the association between opioid dose variability and opioid overdose.Design, setting, and participantsA nested case-control study was conducted in a large Colorado integrated health plan and delivery system from January 1, 2006, through June 30, 2018. Cohort members were individuals prescribed long-term opioid therapy.ExposuresDose variability was defined as the SD of the milligrams of morphine equivalents across each patient's follow-up and categorized based on the quintile distribution of the SD in the cohort (0-5.3, 5.4-9.1, 9.2-14.6, 14.7-27.2, and >27.2 mg of morphine equivalents).Main outcomes and measuresOpioid overdose cases were identified using International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision and International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, Tenth Revision codes. Each case patient with overdose was matched to up to 20 control patients using risk set sampling. Conditional logistic regression models were used to generate matched odds ratios and 95% CIs, adjusted for age, sex, race/ethnicity, drug or alcohol use disorder, tobacco use, benzodiazepine dispensings, medical comorbidities, mental health disorder, opioid dose, and opioid formulation.ResultsIn a cohort of 14 898 patients (mean [SD] age, 56.3 [16.0] years; 8988 [60.3%] female) prescribed long-term opioid therapy, 228 case patients with incident opioid overdose were matched to 3547 control patients. The mean (SD) duration of opioid therapy was 36.7 (33.7) months in case patients and 33.0 (30.9) months in control patients. High-dose variability (SD >27.2 mg of morphine equivalents) was associated with a significantly increased risk of overdose compared with low-dose variability (matched odds ratio, 3.32; 95% CI, 1.63-6.77) independent of opioid dose.Conclusions and relevanceVariability in opioid dose may be a risk factor for opioid overdose, suggesting that practitioners should seek to minimize dose variability when managing long-term opioid therapy.

Project description:BackgroundThe absolute number of older individuals needing medical care and long-term care (LTC) is increasing globally due to the growing ageing population. However, it is uncertain who and what proportion of the population has access to care. Therefore, a systematic review and meta-analysis of the prevalence and reasons for unmet needs for healthcare and long-term care among older people, 65 years old and above, across countries was conducted.MethodsAn information specialist performed a comprehensive search of four major databases (PubMed, EMBASE, Web of Science, and CINAHL) from inception to June 2020 without restrictions on language and date. We did random-effects meta-analysis to obtain pooled prevalence. We stratified the meta-analysis by reasons for unmet need categorized by barrier dimension (availability, accessibility, affordability, and acceptability), survey year, geographic location, and socio-demographic characteristics of the older individual.ResultsAfter screening 3912 articles, we included 101 studies published between 1996 and 2020. Of the 101 studies, 87 studies reported unmet healthcare needs and 14 studies reported unmet LTC needs. Overall, 10.4% (95% CI, 7.3-13.9) of the older population had unmet needs for healthcare. The common reasons for unmet healthcare needs were cost of treatment, lack of health facilities, lack of/conflicting time, health problem not viewed as serious, and mistrust/fear of provider. A significant variation in pooled prevalence of unmet healthcare needs due to cost was found by gender (male [10.9, 95% CI, 8.9-13.1] vs female [14.4, 95% CI, 11.8-17.3]), educational level (primary or less [13.3, 95% CI, 9.6-17.6] vs higher [7.5, 95% CI, 5.9-9.3]), self-reported health (poor [23.2, 95% CI, 18.8-27.8] vs good [4.4, 95% CI, 3.4-5.5]), insurance status (insured [9.0, 95% CI, 7.5-10.6] vs uninsured [27.7, 95% CI, 24.0-31.5]), and economic status of population (poorest [28.2, 95% CI, 14.1-44.9] vs richest [7.1, 95% CI, 3.8-11.3]). One in four (25.1, 95% CI, 17.1-34.2) older people had unmet needs in LTC. Rural residents had a higher prevalence of unmet needs in LTC compared to their urban counterparts.ConclusionWith the population ageing globally, it is necessary to improve access to health care and LTC for older people. Ensuring affordability of health services, reducing geographical barriers, and improving acceptability, will be critical in reducing unmet need. Unmet needs for healthcare were concentrated in population with no education, poor economic group, outpatient health facility user, and uninsured group. With education and economic-based inequalities at the forefront, all countries should focus on improving access to health services by reducing the burden related to healthcare costs.

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Issues in long-term opioid therapy: unmet needs, risks, and solutions.

Publications

Issues in long-term opioid therapy: unmet needs, risks, and solutions.

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