Category: opioid-addiction

Record numbers of Americans have died of drug overdoses during the COVID-19 pandemic, and a new study suggests that these fatalities are hitting communities of color especially hard. Black people had the biggest percentage spike in drug overdose deaths in 2020 — surpassing fatalities among white people for the first time since 1999, according to… Continue reading U.S. Drug Overdose Deaths Are Rising Fastest Among Black People

In a series of novel studies led by Eric Garland, PHD, a licensed clinical social worker and director of the Center on Mindfulness and Integrative Health Intervention Development at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, researchers have found that mindfulness training can reduce chronic pain and opioid dependence. This is especially important, given… Continue reading Study Finds You Can Treat Chronic Pain With Mindfulness Instead of Addictive Opioids

It’s already difficult for people with opioid use disorder (OUD) to get treatment, and that’s especially true for minorities, people in rural areas, and those who are pregnant, who may face incarceration or lose custody of their children if their opioid use is discovered. One 37-year-old woman in Tuscumbia, Alabama, knows this situation well. She… Continue reading Pregnant Patients Struggle to Get Treatment for OUD

It may be easier for patients who take buprenorphine for opioid use disorder to stick with treatment if they receive a weekly or monthly injected version of the drug instead of a daily oral form of this medicine, according to a study published in May 2021 in JAMA Network Open. For the study, researchers compared… Continue reading Patients May Prefer Opioid Addiction Medicine Injected Weekly or Monthly to Daily Pills

New research shows that approximately 1 in 5 “opioid-naive” adults continued to use the pain medication three months after having a procedure. People with depression, bipolar disorder, pulmonary hypertension, or who were smokers were among those with the highest risk for continuing to take opioids, according to the findings which were presented at the Anesthesiology… Continue reading 1 in 5 ‘Opioid-Naive’ People Continue to Take Pain Medication 3 Months After Surgery

The opioid epidemic has garnered an increasing amount of attention from public health officials in the past two decades, but who the interventions have helped has largely depended on class and race. As a result, Black Americans are being left behind as treatment options are made more available to white communities than communities of color.… Continue reading Opioid Crisis Response Leaves Black Americans Behind

Opioid overdoses are often fatal because these drugs can suppress breathing, leading to dangerously low oxygen levels and suffocation. The opioid-overdose antidote naloxone can save lives by blocking the opioids’ interference with breathing — but only if it’s administered quickly by someone who witnesses an overdose. “Naloxone is most effective for fatal overdose prevention when… Continue reading Nearly All U.S. States Need More Naloxone to Combat Opioid Overdose Deaths

Last year, deaths due to drug overdoses topped 100,000 for the first time in history. Overdoses took the lives of more than 107,000 Americans between April 2020 and April 2021, National Center for Health Statistic data showed — an increase of nearly 30 percent compared with their data for the year before. The deaths were… Continue reading How We Treat Opioid Abuse in the LGBTQ+ Community Is Changing — and That's a Good Thing

Between May 2020 and April 2021, nearly 76,000 Americans died from an opioid overdose, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). That grim milestone, from the latest year for which data is available — and the highest opioid overdose toll ever recorded — was driven mostly by synthetic opioids like fentanyl, a… Continue reading Where to Get Free Narcan Nasal Spray

Overdose deaths from opioids, including prescription opioids, heroin, and synthetic opioids like fentanyl, have increased more than 5 times since 1999. In 2020, more than 56,000 deaths involving synthetic opioids other than methadone (Dolophine) occurred in the United States, accounting for 82 percent of all opioid deaths. Fentanyl has now become one of the drugs… Continue reading What Is Fentanyl? A Powerful Drug That’s Often Abused