Articles: opioid.
-
Most people who need and want treatment for opioid addiction cannot access it. Among those who do get treatment, only a fraction receive evidence-based, life-saving medications for opioid use disorder (MOUD). MOUD access is not simply a matter of needing more clinicians or expanding existing treatment capacity. ⋯ Minimally disruptive medicine (MDM) is a framework that focuses on achieving patient goals while imposing the smallest possible burden on patients' lives. Using MDM framing, we highlight how current medical practices and policies worsen the burden of treatment and illness, compound life demands, and strain resources. We then offer suggestions for programmatic and policy changes that would reduce disruption to the lives of those seeking care, improve health care quality and delivery, begin to address disparities and inequities, and save lives.
-
Anesthesia and analgesia · Feb 2023
OCP002, a Mixed Agonist of Opioid and Cannabinoid Receptors, Produces Potent Antinociception With Minimized Side Effects.
Increasing attention has been attracted to the development of bifunctional compounds to minimize the side effects of opioid analgesics. Pharmacological studies have verified the functional interaction between opioid and cannabinoid systems in pain management, suggesting that coactivation of the opioid and cannabinoid receptors may provide synergistic analgesia with fewer adverse reactions. Herein, we developed and characterized a novel bifunctional compound containing the pharmacophores of the mu-opioid receptor agonist DALDA and the cannabinoid peptide VD-Hpα-NH2, named OCP002. ⋯ This study demonstrates that OCP002 produces potent and nontolerance-forming antinociception in mice with reduced opioid- and cannabinoid-related side effects, which strengthen the candidacy of bifunctional drugs targeting opioid/cannabinoid receptors for translational-medical development to replace or assist the traditional opioid analgesics.
-
It is documented that some of the opioids prescribed to manage chronic pain are diverted and used for nonmedical purposes. We investigated whether a skill-based, chronic pain management (CPM) educational program could improve first-year family medicine residents' comfort, knowledge, and concerns in assessing and managing patients who use opioids for chronic noncancer pain. ⋯ A multiactivity CPM educational program for first-year residents was associated with improvement in perceived sense of comfort, knowledge, and concerns in assessing and managing patients who use opioids for chronic noncancer pain. CPM training interventions may be an effective tool to educate first-year residents to implement best practices for pain management with the goal of reducing the chances of inappropriately prescribing controlled substances or denying analgesia.