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From the
Abstract
Introduction: Chronic lower back pain is a leading cause of disability in US adults. Opioid use continues to be controversial despite the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidance on chronic pain management to use nonpharmacologic...
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From the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence. Highlights:
• The number of buprenorphine prescriptions dispensed increase 9.1% from from 2017 to 2018.
• Buprenorphine prescribing by nurse practitioners and physician assistants increased the most.
• Recent legislative and regulatory efforts...
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Newswise — Preventing chronic disease could help curb the opioid epidemic, according to research from the University of Georgia.
The study is the first to examine the relationship between hospitalizations due to opioid misuse and chronic disease.
“When we look at the opioid crisis, most of the...
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In an article published online today at Newsweek.com, researchers report an increase in suicides linked to the use of gabapentin and baclofen. Gabapentin is an antiepileptic, and baclofen is a muscle relaxant and antispasmodic, and they are frequently prescribed for pain instead of opioids. Chronic...
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Newswise — According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH), overdose deaths involving prescription opioids increased nearly 400% from 1999 to 2017. In 2017, more than 70,000 Americans died from drug overdoses, and almost 68% of these...
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Newswise — The University of Pittsburgh School of Dental Medicine is the first in the nation to establish opioid-free pain management guidelines for the vast majority of procedures performed in all of its clinics.
For decades, opioid pain relievers have been routinely prescribed for dental...
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Beginning in November, Oklahoma doctors may prescribe opioids, but the initial prescription will be for a week and at the lowest dose. Dr. Kevin Taubman, Past President of the Oklahoma State Medical Association, said “The initial legislation was designed to try to avoid that initial huge exposure to...
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A team of optometrists sought to find a new approach to the prescribing of opioids post eye surgery. University of Michigan researchers at the eye center examined how to improve the opioid prescribing process to avoid contributing to the nation’s opioid epidemic.
The question: How to avoid...
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When treating acute and chronic pain conditions, there is a need for “balanced” analgesia or multimodal analgesia. These are cases in which opioids as monotherapy are rarely appropriate. The therapeutic role of adjuvant analgesics is to increase the therapeutic index of opioids by producing an...
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Considering the significant risks of surgery, initiatives to improve safety and outcomes would have a broad impact on public health. The number of surgical procedures worldwide has grown to over 232 million annually. Studies report that Americans undergo an average of 9.2 surgical procedures per...