What hospitals can do to help keep excess opioids out of communities
Guidelines to limit size of drug prescriptions don’t leave patients with more pain, study finds
To halt the misuse of opioids, it may help to slash the number of pills prescribed, a new study suggests.
Five months after the implementation of new opioid prescription guidelines at a University of Michigan hospital, roughly 7,000 fewer pills went home with patients — a drop that might reduce the risk of accessible pills leading to substance abuse. But the opioid reduction didn’t leave patients who had undergone a routine surgery with more pain, the team reports online December 6 in JAMA Surgery.