One in five Canadians live with chronic non-cancer pain (CNCP). Due to the historical role opioids had as a key component of CNCP treatment, a number of patients living with CNCP are on long-term opioid therapy (LTOT). I discuss the off-label use of buprenorphine/naloxone as a distinctive treatment option for CNCP and LTOT.
There is growing recognition that opioid prescribing can lead to prescription opioid use disorder (OUD). It is estimated that nearly 115,000 British Columbians have become addicted to opioids. There is a need to safely reduce the volume of new opioid prescriptions for opioid naïve patients.
Health equity-oriented care is now part of my daily practice; the tools created with, and provided by, the EQUIP study have helped to make health care inequity an issue that I can screen for and offer options for management.
I no longer offer rapid methadone tapers to my patients. Buprenorphine/naloxone is now recommended as the first-line opioid agonist treatment for opioid use disorder in British Columbia. This is because of its superior safety profile when compared with methadone as well as an easier transition to take home dosing.
Opioid overdose is a major cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide, and constitutes a serious public health issue. Throughout British Columbia (BC), the landscape of opioid overdose has evolved, first with oxycodone and more recently, illicit fentanyl.
Opioid overdose is a major cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide, and constitutes a serious public health issue. Throughout British Columbia (BC), the landscape of opioid overdose has evolved, first with oxycodone and more recently, illicit fentanyl.
A significant number on patients on daily opioid medications may not be safe to drive a motor vehicle and that particular clinical issue can be problematic to assess within a primary care clinic visit.
Many people mistake the pain of withdrawal as their usual pain and assume their pain improved because the opioid was relieving their pain, when it was more often just relieving the pain associated with the induced withdrawal.
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