Monthly Archives: August 2019

Addiction Is Not Dependence – practicalpainmanagement.com – Aug 2019

In this editorial, Jennifer P. Schneider, MD, PhD, digs into a common—and frustrating—misunderstanding in pain medicine terminology.

FDA approved the buprenorphine implant, branded as Probuphine, in 2016 “for the maintenance treatment of opioid dependence.”

• Was it approved for the treatment of what we now call Opioid Use Disorder (OUD)?
• Or was the intent to approve it for physical dependence, a condition found in most opioid-treated chronic pain patients as well as opioid addicts?

It is not clear from the language.  

Data From Germany Provide More Reasons For Policy to Shift From Prescription Pills to Harm Reduction – Cato.org – By Jeffrey A. Singer – Aug 2019

In February of this year, I co-authored a paper in the Journal of Pain Research explaining why there is no correlation between the amount of opioids prescribed and the incidence of non-medical use or prescription pain-reliever use disorder.

See my post on this paper: Non-medical opioid users were not pain patients

Now researchers in Germany have provided more evidence to pour cold water on the idea of any relationship between the volume of opioid prescribing and the incidence of opioid use disorder.