Recent Reduction Seen in Opioid Prescribing by Surgeons

THURSDAY, Jan. 18, 2024 (HealthDay News) -- Opioid prescribing by surgeons decreased between 2013 and 2017, according to a study published online Jan. 16 in the Journal of the American College of Surgeons.

Apostolos Gaitanidis, M.D., from Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, and colleagues used Medicare Part D data (2013 to 2017) to calculate the mean number of opioid prescriptions per beneficiary (OPBs) for each U.S. county. The analysis included 1,969 of 3,006 U.S. counties (65.5 percent) for opioid prescription data and 1,384 of 3,006 counties for opioid-related deaths (46 percent).

The researchers found that nationwide, the mean OPBs decreased from 1.08 in 2013 to 0.87 in 2017, with 81.6 percent of counties showing the decreasing trend. A lower median population age, higher percentages of bachelor’s degree holders, higher percentages of adults reporting insufficient sleep, higher health care costs, fewer mental health providers, and higher percentages of uninsured adults were county-level variables associated with higher OPBs.

"It is likely that in counties with restricted health care access, due to higher health care costs, lack of insurance coverage, and decreased availability of mental health providers, patients may receive more postoperative opioids as they might not be able to easily obtain additional opioid pills should they need to, or, more likely, that the higher opioid prescribing is masking an unaddressed overall health and mental health burden in this patient population," the authors write.

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