JAMA network open
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Comparative Study
Association Between Preoperative Benzodiazepine Use and Postoperative Opioid Use and Health Care Costs.
The association between preoperative benzodiazepine use and long-term postoperative outcomes is not well understood. ⋯ The findings of this study suggest that, among opioid-naive patients, preoperative benzodiazepine use may be associated with an increased risk of developing long-term opioid use and increased opioid dosages postoperatively, and also may be associated with increased health care costs.
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To cope with the continuing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, state and local officials need information on the effectiveness of policies aimed at curbing disease spread, as well as state-specific characteristics, like the racial mix, associated with increased risks related to the disease. ⋯ In this cross-sectional study, SAHOs were associated with reductions in COVID-19 case rates. These findings could help inform policy makers to address the continued COVID-19 pandemic in the US. The proportion of African American population was positively associated with COVID-19 case rates, and this state-level finding adds to evidence from existing ecological studies using county-level data on racial disparities in COVID-19 infection rates and underlines the urgency of better understanding and addressing these disparities.
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Although hospitalizations for injection drug use-associated infective endocarditis (IDU-IE) have increased during the opioid crisis, utilization of and mortality associated with receipt of medication for opioid use disorder (MOUD) after discharge from the hospital among patients with IDU-IE are unknown. ⋯ In this cohort study, receipt of MOUD was associated with reduced mortality after hospitalization for injection drug use-associated endocarditis only in the month it was received. Efforts to improve MOUD initiation and retention after IDU-IE hospitalization may be beneficial.
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The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act broadened insurance coverage, partially through voluntary state-based Medicaid expansion. ⋯ In this cohort study, state-level expansion of Medicaid was associated with increased Medicaid coverage for men with higher-risk prostate tumors but did not appear to affect treatment patterns at a population level. This may be related to the finding that Medicaid coverage was not associated with increased treatment rates compared with those without insurance.
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Chest radiography is the most common diagnostic imaging examination performed in emergency departments (EDs). Augmenting clinicians with automated preliminary read assistants could help expedite their workflows, improve accuracy, and reduce the cost of care. ⋯ These findings suggest that it is possible to build AI algorithms that reach and exceed the mean level of performance of third-year radiology residents for full-fledged preliminary read of AP frontal chest radiographs. This diagnostic study also found that while the more complex findings would still benefit from expert overreads, the performance of AI algorithms was associated with the amount of data available for training rather than the level of difficulty of interpretation of the finding. Integrating such AI systems in radiology workflows for preliminary interpretations has the potential to expedite existing radiology workflows and address resource scarcity while improving overall accuracy and reducing the cost of care.