Publications

• In 2016, 8485 (0.6%) of the 1.5 million opioid prescriptions filled by US adults and children with family insurance plans occurred when at least 1 family member met criteria for prescriber and pharmacy shopping. *
• Among the 8485 index fills, 68.1% of prescribing clinicians were physicians, 7.9% were physician assistants, 7.2% were nurse practitioners, and 43% were dentists.
• The most common physician specialties among the 8485 index fills were family medicine (17.1%), pain medicine (16.4%), internal medicine (9.6%), and orthopedic surgery (6.5%)

*prescriber and pharmacy shopping is when an individual obtains opioids from high numbers of prescribers and pharmacies

• 60.4% of caregivers reported storage education despite only 18.3% keeping the opioids in locked storage. Caregivers who reported verbal and/or written storage education were more likely to lock opioids in storage
• Of the 606 caregivers surveyed, 451 (74%) had leftover opioids. Of the 451, only half (50.1%) reported disposal education and a quarter (24.6%) disposed of the excess opioids. 
• There was no association between leftover opioid disposal and verbal and/or written disposal education.

• 56% of families who only received standard postoperative discharge instructions on opioid safety reported proper opioid disposal compared to 72% of families who received a drug disposal bag and the standard postoperative discharge instructions.
• 20% increase in the rate of proper opioid disposal with the provision of a drug disposal bag. 
• Higher than expected rate of opioid disposal among families that did not receive a disposal bag suggests that standardized, multimodal, opioid related education provided to families of surgical patients does impact disposal rates.

• 6% of patients who received usual care reported disposing of opioids, compared with 33.3% who received education regarding disposal locations and 57.1% of patients who received a charcoal activated bag.
• The odds of opioid disposal were almost four times higher among participants who received a charcoal bag compared with those who received usual care.