Role of Medical Providers in Overdose Prevention

" Medical Providers may have the opportunity to maximize patient quality of life by providing prescription opioids, yet those same medicines have contributed to the fact that drug overdose has overtaken motor vehicle crashes as the #1 cause of injury death in the United States." (prescribetoprevent.org)

Providers can consider taking the stance of "risky medicines," instead of "risky patients" and engage in proactive dialogue with patients to minimize poisoning, oversedation, and overdose risk with patients who need opioid medications to improve their quality of life. Discussing an emergency overdose/poisoning/oversedation plan and naloxone prescribing is an essential component of keeping patients alive. (prescribetoprevent.org)

It is also essential to consider the potential impact that these medications may have on others in the home including children. Children are at risk of accidental exposure to these potentially lethal medications any time they are in the homes where they live. Think of the "one pill can kill" substances, opioids are in that class of substances.  

Assessing Overdose Risk and Patient History:

• Review medications
• Ask about children in the home
• Take a substance abuse history
• Check the prescription monitoring program
• Take an overdose history - Ask your patient whether they have:
  • ​Overdosed or had a bad reaction to taking opioid medications?
  • Witnessed an overdose?
  • Received training to prevent, recognize, or respond to an overdose or medication-related oversedation?

Prescribing naloxone is legal in the state of Utah. Consider prescribing it to your patients and their families.  There is no Physician-Patient Relationship required.  

In the state of Utah, physicians, nurse practitioners, and physician assistants who have prescribing authority may prescribe and distribute naloxone rescue kits to anyone at risk of experiencing an opioid overdose or at risk of witnessing an opioid overdose according to UT code § 26-55-101

The American Medical Association (AMA) and American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP) have issued Policy Statements in support of access to naloxone rescue kits, as have many other professional societies

• From the AMA: "Opioid addiction and drug abuse place a great burden on patients and society, and the number of fatal poisonings involving opioid analgesics more than tripled between 1999-2006. Naloxone is a drug that can be used to reverse the effecgs of opioid overdose. The AMA has adopted a policy to support further implementation of community-based programs that offer naloxone and other opioid overdose prevention services. The policy also encourages education of health care workers and opioid users about the use of naloxone in preventing opioid overdose fatalities."

Below are Prescription forms and information you can print out for prescribing to your patients.  There is also a comparison chart for the various available naloxone products.