New guidance for inpatient opioid prescribing
ORLANDO – A new guidance statement for opioid prescribing for hospitalized adults who have acute noncancer pain has been issued by the Society for Hospital Medicine.
The statement comes after an exhaustive systematic review that found just four existing guidelines met inclusion criteria, though none focused specifically on acute pain in hospitalized adults.
Among the key issues taken from the existing guidelines and addressed in the new SHM guidance statement are deciding when opioids – or a nonopioid alternative – should be used, as well as selection of appropriate dose, route, and duration of administration. The guidance statement advises that clinicians prescribe the lowest effective opioid dose for the shortest duration possible.
Mike Stanczyk/MDedge News
Dr. Shoshana Herzig
Best practices for screening and monitoring before and during opioid initiation is another major focus, as is minimizing opioid-related adverse events, both by careful patient selection and by judicious prescribing.
Finally, the statement acknowledges that, when a discharge medication list includes an opioid prescription, there is potential risk for misuse or diversion. Accordingly, the recommendation is to limit the duration of outpatient prescribing to 7 days of medication, with consideration of a 3-5 day prescription.
An interactive session at the 2018 SHM annual meeting presenting the guidance statement focused less on marching through the guidance’s 16 specific statements, and more on teasing out the why, when, how – and how long – of inpatient opioid prescribing.
