| Article
The American Medical Association just released a new OPIOID TASK FORCE 2020 PROGRESS REPORT in the hopes of reducing drug overdoses and deaths. Although prescription opioid overdose deaths have decreased, illicit drugs such as heroin, methamphetamine, and cocaine have risen. Last year, fentanyl...
| Article
| Video
Dr. Zacharoff examines the roles of both prescription and illicit opioids—heroin and fentanyl—as components of today’s “opioid abuse epidemic”. There are similarities and important differences and the task for clinicians is to minimize harms while addressing the needs of patients in pain.
| Podcast
The number of deaths from prescription opioids from 2014 to 2016 were essentially unchanged, but deaths from illicit fentanyl derivatives over the same time period increased by almost 650%. Between 2010 and 2015, we know that by county, prescribed morphine daily dose equivalents (MEDD) per capita...
| Article
A study of heroin users in Baltimore concludes that most are aware that fentanyl is likely present in the drug they are using while also acknowledging their unpreparedness to handle an overdose event that is likely to result from their activity. Researchers from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of...
| Article
Despite the existence of stringent regulatory controls, clinicians are prescribing potentially lethal fentanyl products to patients who should not be receiving them. So concludes a study from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health published earlier this week in the Journal of the...