Postoperative pain management has always been a major focus of patient care. However, the opioid crisis is increasing the challenges healthcare leaders face because of the call for a national change in modalities of pain management. Regulatory bodies, specifically, are executing control to confront the opioid epidemic head on, making…

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What is the current state of marijuana research? Russell: Marijuana research is unlike any other drug research. Researchers have to jump through a lot of hoops with the federal government to study it. As a result, people are using marijuana before there is enough science to prove safety and efficacy.…

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Editor's Note In this study, patients in teaching hospitals in Michigan received significantly larger postoperative opioid prescriptions and had higher rates of high-risk prescribing compared with nonteaching hospitals in the state. The amount of opioid prescribed in initial opioid prescriptions varied 4.7-fold across hospitals, from 130 to 616 oral morphine…

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Editor's Note Despite concerns about addiction and side effects of opioids, patients still expect them to be prescribed and believe them to be the most effective for postoperative pain relief, finds this study presented October 13 at the Anesthesiology 2018 annual meeting in San Francisco. Researchers gave a 13-question survey…

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Editor's Note Interventions at the physician or organizational level (eg, workflow changes) were found to be better tools for creating change in postoperative opioid prescribing than interventions at the patient level (eg, patient education), in this review. This analysis of eight studies published after 2000 that included 2,272 patients found…

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Editor's Note Preliminary data, reported August 15, by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that drug overdose mortality in the US hit record high levels last year, increasing to more than 72,000 deaths. The increase in mortality was driven mainly by fatalities involving fentanyl and other synthetic opioids.…

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Editor's Note Naloxone administration by emergency medical services increased 75.1% between 2012 and 2016, mirroring a 79.7% increase in fatal opioid overdoes during the same time period, according to the August 10 Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Young adults made…

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Editor's Note In this study of 34,186 surgical patients in the University of Michigan Health System, 23.1% were taking opioids preoperatively, and the use of opioids was associated with a more negative medical and pain profile. Patient age, tobacco use, illicit drug use, higher pain severity, depression, higher Fibromyalgia Survey…

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Editor's Note Food & Drug Administration (FDA) commissioner, Scott Gottlieb, MD, on July 9 issued a statement on balancing access to appropriate treatment for patients with chronic and end-of-life pain with the need to stem the misuse and abuse of opioids. As the FDA considers new steps to address the…

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Editor's Note Opioid abuse or dependence after major surgical procedures was associated with increased readmission rates and healthcare utilization. Of 16,016,842 patients in the National Readmission Database analyzed, 94,903 (0.6%) had diagnoses of opioid abuse or dependence. Comparing patients with and without opioid abuse or dependence, researchers found that patients…

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