More than 40,000 people in the province of Ontario were given new prescriptions for high doses of opioid drugs in 2016, despite Canada’s worsening opioid crisis. That was a decrease of 25,000 new starts, or two per cent, from 2013. The information comes from Health Quality Ontario, a body which advises the provincial government on the quality of health care.
Canadians are big users of opioids
Canadians are the world’s second-largest per-capita users of prescription opioids after the United States, according to the Report of the International Narcotics Control Board for 2016. In 2016, 865 people in Ontario died from opioid toxicity. That was up from 366 in 2003. Many of those deaths involved drugs from street sources. Overdose deaths have increased dramatically across the country in recent years.
In 2016 in Ontario, here were 4,427 visits to hospital emergency rooms related to opioid use.
Emergency hospital visits more than doubled
Related visits to hospital emergency rooms in Ontario more than doubled to 4,427 in 2016 from 1,858 in 2003, according to Public Health Ontario.
A dose of opioids is considered to be anything over 90 mg of morphine per day or the equivalent of another opioid. People taking higher doses are several times more likely to overdose than are those on lower doses.
And a “new prescription” is defined as one issued to patients who have not received one in the previous six months.
Health authorities are looking at ways to treat pain without the use of opioid drugs.
New initiatives to tackle opioid problems
At the request of the government, Health Quality Ontario is in the final stages of developing standards for prescribing opioids for acute pain, chronic pain and one on identifying and treating people with opioid use disorder. A news release says these will be put into action by providing data, tools and supports to doctors for “appropriate prescribing.”
There are several other initiatives to prevent opioid addiction and overdose. These include designing programs to help patients who have had major surgery better manage their pain, guidelines for dentist and dental specialists, and more clinics to help people deal with hip, knee and lower back pain without the use of opioids.
Ontario provides some examples
These initiatives are underway in Canada’s biggest province and are likely to be closely watched by health authorities in other jurisdictions.
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