The United States had more than double the rate of premature overdose deaths of at least 12 comparable countries in a recent study. The study compared the trends and patterns in premature mortality rates among people age 20 – 64 years due to drug overdose. The data was compiled from the 13 members of the Organisation
Each time a more powerful drug is developed, there are assurances, studies, and promises. Each sleep aid, narcotic, anxiolytic, and muscle relaxant has been released with “strict monitoring” and “no known adverse effects or dependency”. And each time the public is burned in the long run. This poo-pooing of risk, although it may sound far-fetched,
The FDA sent letters to manufacturers of loperamide, a longstanding and commonly used treatment for diarrhea, asking them to change the size of the drug’s packaging to limit the amount of opioid drugs in the package. The agency aims to discontinue the large bottles in which loperamide is often sold to deter its abuse. See
A nationwide study of Veterans Health Administration patients found a high percentage with functional abdominal pain received a prescription for an opioid medication during a 1-year period. The risks of opioid overuse has reached epidemic proportions and has received national attention. Compared with patients who had a structural GI disorder such as inflammatory bowel disease
A study presented at the World Congress of Gastroenterology found patients with Clostridium difficile who received opioids during their hospital stay had higher rates of complicated infection and in-hospital mortality and longer length of average hospital stay, compared with patients in the control group. The findings were based on medical records of 302 patients hospitalized
Brush with death had little effect on subsequent use As described in a JAMA research letter, Julie M. Donohue, PhD, of the University of Pittsburgh, and colleagues looked at five years of claims data for Medicaid-covered patients in Pennsylvania. They examined records of opioid use both before and after the overdose for 6,000 patients with
