Pain Medication

The Importance of Treating Opioid Use Disorder in the Justice System

The True, Deadly Scope of America’s Fentanyl Problem

How the Brain Makes Pain Unpleasant

A specific collection of neurons in the basolateral amygdala, a brain region crucial for affect, was active when mice experienced pain. Deactivating this collection of neurons resulted in a loss of negative affective responses to painful stimuli, although the animals still perceived the pain.

Reviewing NIDA’s 2019 Achievements and Looking to the Future

Worms lead scientists to a new anti-opioid system

A team of NIH-funded scientists used worms to discover a surprising biological system that counteracts the effects of opioids, offering a potential new target for improving the safety of opioid pain relievers.

NIH establishes network to improve opioid addiction treatment in criminal justice settings

The National Institutes of Health will award 12 grants to form the Justice Community Opioid Innovation Network (JCOIN) to support research on quality addiction treatment for opioid use disorder (OUD) in criminal justice settings nationwide.

Co-prescribing naloxone in Medicare Part D increases

A study found that overall national rates for naloxone co-prescription along with any opioid among Medicare Part D patients increased from 1.5 per 1000 patients receiving opioid prescriptions in 2016 to 4.6 per 1000 in 2017.

Prescription opioid misuse in high school linked to later heroin use

A NIDA-funded study suggests that misuse of prescription opioid pain relievers in high school could be linked to heroin use later in life.

Opioid Dose Variability Associated with Overdose

A new study funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse found that high dose variability increases the odds for an opioid overdose independent of dose alone.

Opioids without the risk of addiction?

Investigators have found that the opioid-galanin receptor heteromers determine the different effects of methadone as compared to morphine and fentanyl, showing methadone with a weaker ability to activate the dopaminergic system linked to the euphoric effects of opioids.