opioid overdose Archives

The Authors’ Own Words: Telephone-Based Opioid Overdose Education and Naloxone Distribution (OEND) Pharmacy Consult Clinic

Dec 31, 2019 by AMERSA

The Authors’ Own Words:

We ask authors to describe their impressions regarding the implications of their accepted work, how their findings will change practice, and what is noteworthy about the work.

Telephone-Based Opioid Overdose Education and Naloxone Distribution (OEND) Pharmacy Consult Clinic

Eric M. Szydlowski PharmD & Stephen S. Caruana PharmD

Substance Abuse Vol. 39, Iss. 2, 2018

“The article provides outline and practical information on a large scale pharmacy-based naloxone education and distribution initiative. This process could be implemented at other VA facilities and offers insights that could be adapted to improve community access to naloxone through pharmacy engagement elsewhere.”

The Authors’ Own Words: Ambulance-attended opioid overdoses: an examination into overdose locations and the role of a safe injection facility

Dec 1, 2019 by AMERSA

The Authors’ Own Words:

We ask authors to describe their impressions regarding the implications of their accepted work, how their findings will change practice, and what is noteworthy about the work.

Ambulance-attended opioid overdoses: an examination into overdose locations and the role of a safe injection facility

Desiree Madah-Amiri, PhD; Arne Kristian Skulberg, MD; Anne-Cathrine Braarud, MD, PhD; Ola Dale, MD; Fridtjof Heyerdahl, MD, PhD; Philipp Lobmaier, MD, PhD; & Thomas Clausen, MD, PhD

Substance Abuse Vol. 40, Iss. 3, 2019

“This manuscript explores what role a safe injection facility may have on opioid overdoses attended by ambulance services in Oslo, Norway. The findings from the study show that overdoses often occurred at the safe injection facility and that patients had more severe clinical symptoms there than from other locations. However, these patients were less likely to receive ambulance transport, and when the facility was closed, there was a 40% increased odds for patients to need ambulance transport for further medical treatment. Together the results suggest that people at risk of overdosing use the safe injection facility, and that there is difference in overdose patterns when the facility was closed.”

The Authors’ Own Words: Use of Online Opioid Overdose Prevention Training for First Year Medical Students: A Comparative Analysis of Online vs In-Person training

Nov 21, 2019 by AMERSA

The Authors’ Own Words:

We ask authors to describe their impressions regarding the implications of their accepted work, how their findings will change practice, and what is noteworthy about the work.

Use of Online Opioid Overdose Prevention Training for First Year Medical Students: A Comparative Analysis of Online vs In-Person training

Noah Berland, MD, MS; Daniel Lugassy, MD; Aaron Fox, MD, MS; Keith Goldfeld, DrPh; So-Young Oh, MS; Babak Tofighi, MD, MSc; & Kathleen Hanley, MD

Substance Abuse Vol. 40, Iss. 2, 2019

“Using conventional in-person education modalities to adding topics related to substance use disorders to medical school curriculum, or simply expanding training to greater numbers of individuals is challenging and often faculty intensive. In our article we demonstrate that online administered opioid overdose prevention training produced not meaningfully different outcomes from in-person administered opioid overdose prevention training. We believe that this provides evidence of further expanding opioid overdose prevention training by using online training modalities to be less resource intense and more easily disseminated. This article further adds to the new and growing research comparing online and in-person modalities for education.“

The Authors’ Own Words: Socioeconomic and Geographical Disparities in Prescription and Illicit Opioid Related Overdose Deaths in Orange County, California from 2010-2014

Nov 11, 2019 by AMERSA

The Authors’ Own Words:

We ask authors to describe their impressions regarding the implications of their accepted work, how their findings will change practice, and what is noteworthy about the work.

Socioeconomic and Geographical Disparities in Prescription and Illicit Opioid Related Overdose Deaths in Orange County, California from 2010-2014

John R. Marshall, MD, MPH; Stephen F. Gassner, BA; Craig L. Anderson, PhD; Richelle J. Cooper, MD, MSHS; Shahram Lotfipour; MD, MPH; Bharath Chakravarthy, MD, MPH

Substance Abuse Vol. 40, Iss. 1, 2019

“Successfully combating the opioid epidemic requires a thorough understanding of the socioeconomic factors of the population targeted. This ecologic study within Orange County, California aims to establish the prevalence of opioid related overdose deaths and estimate associations with socioeconomic indicators. Recent literature found that despite down-trending death rates due to prescription opioids, overall opioid death rates have been increasing largely due to the increase in heroin use. Similar results were found in this study as well as an alarming need to address the heroin problem amongst homeless population as well as other issues such as polysubstance co-ingestion, opioid abuse in older persons, and opioid abuse in lower socioeconomic status areas. Opioid abuse is a disease that does not recognize geographic boundaries fully treat this epidemic will require expanding interventions both geographically and socioeconomically.“

The Authors’ Own Words: Development and evaluation of a standardized research definition for opioid overdose outcomes

Nov 10, 2019 by AMERSA

The Authors’ Own Words:

We ask authors to describe their impressions regarding the implications of their accepted work, how their findings will change practice, and what is noteworthy about the work.

Development and evaluation of a standardized research definition for opioid overdose outcomes

Ingrid A. Binswanger, MD, MPH, MS; Komal J. Narwaney, PhD; Edward M. Gardner, MD; Barbara A. Gabella, MSPH; Susan L. Calcaterra, MD, MPH; Jason M. Glanz, PhD

Substance Abuse Vol. 40, Iss. 1, 2019

“There is little consensus on how to verify opioid overdose outcomes for research purposes. To ensure reproducibility, minimize misclassification, and permit data harmonization across studies, standardized and consistent overdose definitions are needed. Thus, Binswanger and colleagues developed and evaluated a case criteria classification scheme for pharmaceutical opioid and heroin overdoses in two distinct health systems, using information commonly available in electronic health records. This scheme was compared with clinician impression and encounter documentation. This novel case criteria classification scheme for opioid overdose represents a potential option for a consistent and reproducible definition of overdose in multi-site research.“