Outpatient Surgery Magazine

Special Edition: Opioids - January 2020 - Subscribe to Outpatient Surgery Magazine

Outpatient Surgery Magazine, providing current information on Surgical Services, Surgical Facility Administration, Outpatient Surgery News and Trends, OR Excellence and more.

Issue link: http://outpatientsurgery.uberflip.com/i/1198986

Contents of this Issue

Navigation

Page 38 of 58

es almost every surgical discipline, according to Dr. Brummett, who notes orthopods and otolaryngolo- gists are particularly lagging in addressing this issue, while general surgeons and urologists are ahead of the curve. He believes the key to addressing the problem lies in shared leverage of evidence-based data. For example, Michigan OPEN's prescribing recommendations are available online for use (michigan- open.org/prescribing-recom- mendations). "When I hear groups say they're going to create pre- scribing recommendations for sur- geries for which we already have a couple years' worth of data, I think that's a missed opportunity," says Dr. Brummett. "Somebody's going to put a lot of time, energy and effort into that. I'd rather see them take all that effort and energy and put it toward implementation or other positive change rather than simply recreating what we've already done." The challenge of relieving a patient's post-operative pain by reducing or even eliminating opioids from their regimen isn't an easy task, but the effort to standardize opioids prescriptions based on procedure type has game-changing potential for public health. It's taking a while, but the movement is starting to gain traction. "Overprescribing is less of a problem than it once was," says Dr. Brummett. "But we still have a long way to go." OSM J A N U A R Y 2 0 2 0 • O U T PA T I E N T S U R G E R Y. N E T • 3 9 • HEALTHY AND HAPPY Research shows patients who are prescribed fewer opioids don't feel significantly more pain or are any less satisfied with the care they receive. Margaret Sherman, RN

Articles in this issue

Links on this page

Archives of this issue

view archives of Outpatient Surgery Magazine - Special Edition: Opioids - January 2020 - Subscribe to Outpatient Surgery Magazine