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Settling into the fall season is the perfect time to ground ourselves—ground our commitment to delivering excellent care, improving patient outcomes, and leveraging every beneficial tool at our disposal. What better way to kick off Fall than by highlighting the key learnings around pain management...
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In honor of American Pharmacists Month this October, we want to highlight the essential role healthcare professionals play in managing opioid use disorder (OUD). OUD presents significant challenges, especially when treating patients with concurrent pain. This complexity arises from the delicate...
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The 2022 CDC Clinical Practice Guideline for Prescribing Opioids gives providers the benefit of the doubt and preserves their discretion. It is vital to read and understand the implementation considerations.
Closing the Gap: Healthcare Professionals Need Better Training in Therapy Initiation
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Elimination of X-Waiver and Training Requirements for New MATE ACT
As a healthcare provider, you've probably heard about the Medication Access and Training Expansion (MATE) Act but may be unclear about precisely what it means for you. This comprehensive overview can help you better understand it...
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The U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, National Institutes of Health released a press release dated September 18, 2023, detailing a study that suggests that higher buprenorphine doses are associated with improved retention in treatment for opioid use disorder.
According to the US...
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While the disease of addiction knows no boundaries, unfortunately treatment for opioid use disorder seems to. In yet another example of healthcare inequity, Black and Latin patients have less access than Whites to buprenorphine. Why? That’s what researchers at the University of Washington hope to...
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JAMA reports a noted increase in opioid use disorder treatments in those enrolled in Medicaid. The study looked at over a million enrollees from 11 states: medication treatment prevalence in 2014 was 47.8% and in 2018, 57.1%. Of note, use of OUD medication was higher in pregnant women and white...
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Challenges. That’s what prescribers are facing when prescribing buprenorphine. They face barriers, hurdles, difficulties helping their patients overcome opioid use disorder. Even though things are changing—the federal government has removed some barriers, such as requiring special training for...
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Due to the opioid epidemic and public health crisis, opioid use disorder treatment is greatly needed. In an effort to make the use of buprenorphine easier, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) plans to no longer require an X-waiver for prescriptions. By deregulating buprenorphine...
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From the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence. Highlights:
• The number of buprenorphine prescriptions dispensed increase 9.1% from from 2017 to 2018.
• Buprenorphine prescribing by nurse practitioners and physician assistants increased the most.
• Recent legislative and regulatory efforts...