Naloxone prescriptions for youth increase more than 600%
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Key takeaways:
- Pharmacies dispensed 6.6 prescriptions per 100,000 youth in 2017 and 50.9 per 100,000 youth in 2022.
- Prescriptions from pediatricians rose nearly 1,000% over the 6-year period.
Naloxone prescriptions among youth in the United States rose more than 600% from 2017 to 2022, according to findings published in Pediatrics.
“Increases are likely related to increased awareness among clinicians, parents and youth due to the prominence of opioid overdoses, particularly in adolescent populations,” Andrew Terranella, MD, MPH, from the Division of Overdose Prevention at the CDC, told Healio. “There has also been increased focus on promoting harm reduction in communities by public health departments to educate clinicians on the importance of naloxone.”
Terranella and colleagues used IQVIA National Prescription Audit Patient Insights data to track naloxone prescriptions for people aged 10 to 19 years from 2017 through 2022. They compared prescription trends among children with prescriptions for adults aged 20 years and older. They also looked at payer and cost information from 2020 through 2022.
Youth received 59,077 naloxone prescriptions during the study period. In 2017, pharmacies dispensed 6.6 prescriptions per 100,000 youth. In 2022, pharmacies dispensed 50.9 prescriptions per 100,000 youth — a 669% increase. The increase was higher among girls than boys (722% vs. 625%), although dispensing rates were lower among girls overall, according to the researchers.
Naloxone prescription rates rose among adults as well (378%) over the 6-year period.
General practice physicians were the most common prescribers (16.5%), followed by nurse practitioners (14.2%), surgical specialists (12.7%), family physicians (9.5%) and physician assistants (9.2%). Pediatricians accounted for 5.6% of prescriptions, and there was a 991% increase in prescriptions written by the specialty over the study period. The increase among all other specialties was 674%.
Most payers had low or no out-of-pocket costs, but 20% paid more than $25 and 6% paid more than $75 for prescriptions, the researchers wrote.
“Naloxone saves lives and should be offered to all adolescents who use substances including opioids, who live with someone who uses opioids or other substances, who are prescribed opioids, or who live in homes where opioids are present,” Terranella said. “In addition to making naloxone available to all adolescents who might benefit, clinicians can incorporate screening for substance use disorders, educating adolescents and parents on fentanyl and overdose prevention education, and other forms of harm reduction into routine health services for adolescents.”
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