Breaking The Cycle: Opioid Crisis

"Opioid Epidemic" is the phrase which is being used to describe the era that the USA is currently in, with opioid addiction driving the leading cause of accidental deaths for drug overdose in the USA. Opioid death statistics reaching numbers as high as 33,000 in 2015 alone, with 1000 people being treated in emergency departments each day for using prescription opioids such as oxycodone, hydrocodone, codeine, morphine, fentanyl, and many others not as directed.

The question is: why has this happened?

Some have stated that despite good intentions, physicians and health professionals have played a role in this current crisis, because although doctors try to follow “first, do no harm," this has directly collided with their ethically-driven decisions to alleviate pain in the form of opioid prescriptions.

Others have stated that the problem is with prescribing opioids for chronic pain. As stated by, Daniel Pendick from the Harvard Health Blog, "How much of an opioid is needed to block pain perception in the brain is a moving target—and the trajectory is always upward. After a brief honeymoon of profound pain relief when you first start taking opioids, their pain-numbing effect fades and the dose escalates rapidly. In months, you can end up taking dangerously high doses just to maintain the same level of relief."

In wake of the Opioid crisis, some papers such as the American Academy of Neurology, have stated that "the harms of opioids often outweigh the benefits for treating chronic noncancer pain." Indeed a recent examination of medicare Patients visiting Emergency Departments revealed that they often received opioids without knowing they were opioids.

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Also consider joining a free Opioid EDX Course to become more informed on the crisis and what you can do to help: https://www.edx.org/course/opioid-crisis-america-harvardx-hhp100#!