Opioids

Prevention is an essential part of the continuum in addressing mental, emotional, and behavioral disorders among young people, but it can be a challenge to define and implement.

The John Hopkins Center for Indigenous Health launched the new Tribal Principles website which offers culturally relevant, Indigenous-centered guidance for Tribes to consider when creating spending plans for the use of Tribal opioid settlements. This work complements the broad state/national settlement guidance led at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

While each state faces unique challenges in distributing opioid settlement funding, they also share many common priorities for settlements and other statewide efforts to address the opioid and substance use crisis. Why it matters: Opioid settlement funding provides a unique opportunity to address current gaps in the addiction care system as a whole.

Xylazine, a veterinary tranquilizer not approved for human use, has been increasingly identified in parts of the U.S. illicit drug supply.

The opioid epidemic is a result of a complex system of varied and interrelated factors. This webinar introduced a systems thinking approach and offers tools to address complex public health challenges. Additionally, the webinar described opportunities for grantees to further develop their capacity to apply systems thinking to a local opioid response.

The rate of drug overdose deaths in the USA has more than tripled since the turn of the century, and rates are disproportionately high among the American Indian/Alaska Native (AI/AN) population. Little is known about the overall historical trends in AI/AN opioid-only and opioid/polysubstance-related mortality. This study will address this gap.

Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid typically used to treat patients with chronic severe pain or severe pain following surgery.  Fentanyl is a Schedule II controlled substance that is similar to morphine but about 100 times more potent.  Under the supervision of a licensed medical professional, fentanyl has a legitimate medical use.  Patients prescribed fentanyl should be monitored for potential misuse or abuse.

Background: The US overdose crisis is driven by fentanyl, heroin, and prescription opioids. One evidence-based policy response has been to broaden naloxone distribution, but how much naloxone a community would need to reduce the incidence of fatal overdose is unclear. We aimed to estimate state-level US naloxone need in 2017 across three main naloxone access points (community-based programmes, provider prescription, and pharmacy-initiated distribution) and by dominant opioid epidemic type (fentanyl, heroin, and prescription opioid).

The US overdose crisis is driven by fentanyl, heroin, and prescription opioids. One evidence-based policy response has been to broaden naloxone distribution, but how much naloxone a community would need to reduce the incidence of fatal overdose is unclear. We aimed to estimate state-level US naloxone need in 2017 across three main naloxone access points (community-based programs, provider prescription, and pharmacy-initiated distribution) and by dominant opioid epidemic type (fentanyl, heroin, and prescription opioid).