Opioid Prescription trend in the US: Evidence from the National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey (NAMCS) Data 2006-2010

Objective:

There is a large and mounting problem of opioid abuse nationally. This study intends to capture the trends in opioid prescribing and factors affecting these trends using the National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey (NAMCS) from 2006-2010.

Methods:

NAMCS, a nationally representative annual survey of the provision and utilization of outpatient medical care services in the US, was used. Main outcome measure was opioid drug prescribed. Opioid drugs were sorted using the specific codes and if the prescription contained any of the drugs it was coded as ‘opioid prescribed’. Survey weighted logistic regression models were fit to determine factors influencing the opioid prescription pattern.

Results:

Our study reveals that there is steady increase in opioid prescriptions since 2006. In 2006 10% prescription (88,004,315) contained opioid while the figure increased over the course of next three years, e.g., 100,524,733 (10%) in 2007, 104,058,535 (11%) in 2008, 127,308,596 (12%) in 2009, and declined slightly in absolute number 116,990,998 (12%) in 2010. Multivariate analyses revealed that over the years, younger patients (50-64), suffering from chronic diseases, and insured by Medicare or other type of insurance were more likely to get opioid prescription, while patients with higher education, and seen by surgeons were less likely to get opioids.

Conclusions:

Our study shows that opioid prescription was on rise till 2009 and was fairly constant in 2010. Excessive dependence on opioid is detrimental to health and the pattern of increasing use of opioids demands further investigation into the prudent use of opioids.