Fentanyl

Patients who used cannabis and underwent opioid agonist therapy in Vancouver had a significantly lower risk of being exposed to fentanyl, according to a study published in Drug and Alcohol Dependence.

In patients with STEMI given crushed ticagrelor before PCI, using IV acetaminophen instead of IV fentanyl as a painkiller did not increase pain levels or platelet reactivity and prevented delay of ticagrelor’s effects, researchers reported.

In a study conducted in Los Angeles and San Francisco among 395 people who inject drugs, researchers found that participants who reported perceived illicit fentanyl use were at an increased risk for injection-related infectious diseases.

Significantly fewer patients undergoing cataract surgery who received intracameral Omidria experienced severe pain or required intraoperative fentanyl than did patients who received epinephrine, according to a study.

University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston implemented an opioid-minimizing, multimodal pain regimen to maximize pain relief and decrease patient exposure to opioids.

A CDC spokesperson said provisional data and other reports signify that “progress is being made” in the opioid epidemic.

Synthetic opioids like fentanyl “kill on a scale that is unprecedented among illegal drugs,” according to a new report conducted by the RAND Corporation.

CDC data show opioid deaths dropped 4.6% overall during a 12-month period that encompassed 2017 and 2018, but there was an 11.1% increase in opioid deaths related to illicitly manufactured fentanyl.

Nearly 9,000 children and adolescents died as a result of prescription and illicit opioid poisonings between 1999 and 2016 in the United States, according to findings published in JAMA Network Open. Most of these deaths occurred in teenagers, who saw an increase in heroin-related mortality of more than 400% during that time.