Over the years, the prevalence of prescription drug abuse has become an increasingly apparent issue — one both the medical and nonmedical community cannot ignore given its visible impact.
Opioids are one of the most commonly abused agents because they cause the release of dopamine to achieve a pleasurable effect. As a result, clinicians have a difficult time determining whether patients are seeking out these drugs for valid reasons or are highly addicted to these agents. It is ultimately up to prescribers to make this decision when patients come into their office.
Opioid abuse and misuse has led to stricter policies as well as initiatives being put into place, given the associated deaths and lives that can be negatively impacted by the epidemic.
In an effort to curtail the ongoing abuse of opioids, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) — at the urging of Congress — recently decided to take action to increase the number of abuse-deterrent formulations for opioid medications and providing options for pain medications and access to naloxone. The proposed plan strives to correct the epidemic while at the same time providing effective pain management to those patients who are in need of assistance.
The FDA also seeks to continue evaluating the risks versus benefits of opioid use and create an expert advisory panel that will meet and approve any new drug applications that are presented for opioids that do not possess an abuse-deterrent property. The intent is to provide both a safer and effective means of opioid delivery because of the seriousness of the risks of opioid abuse, overdose, and ultimately deaths that can result.
For pharmacists, it is important to always evaluate the medication profile and dispensing patterns for patients, looking at refill histories or the request for opioids from multiple prescribers. Once an assessment can be made that there might be a case of opioid abuse, contact can be made to the primary prescriber to alert of possibly misuse and recommendations for addressing the issue.
The current roles and responsibilities of the pharmacist provide them the opportunity to identify cases for possible drug abuse — not only those related to opioids — and assist with the mission of stopping the ongoing behavior. In addition, pharmacists are becoming trained to identify and intervene if necessary with the treatment of drug abuse problems, depending on the facility and the ability to refer an issue to another healthcare professional for follow-up.
The mission of defeating the growing epidemic of opioid abuse is one that has many supporters. Through the involvement of various healthcare disciplines as well as strategic plans that can measure impact and outcomes, it is expected that a change will occur.