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November 2, 2016
  • Major Traumatic Injury Rarely Leads to
    Long-Term Opioid Use

    How much of the nation’s opioid epidemic is driven by patients receiving painkillers for major trauma and then becoming hooked on the drugs? Very little, a new study suggests. Find out the likelihood of those patients still using opiates after a year.

  • Guide Helps Pharmacists Be More Aware of Statin, Cardiac Drug Interactions

    Chances are good that many of the statin prescriptions filled by pharmacists are for patients already taking other heart disease medications. That’s why the American Heart Association has come out with new guidance on how to avoid potential adverse interactions between those drugs and the widely prescribed cholesterol-lowering medications. Here are the details.

  • Pharmacist Interviews Help Clarify Which Patients Have Beta-Lactam Allergies
    Patients who believe themselves to be allergic to beta-lactams—but in actuality are not —unnecessarily limit their antibiotic options. A pilot program in upstate New York used pharmacist interviews to help sort out which patients really needed to avoid those medications. Here are the results.
  • Placebos Reduce Pain Even When Patients Know They Lack Active Ingredients 
    How much of pain relief is the effect of medication and how much occurs simply in the context of the patient-clinician relationship? That is the question raised by a new study finding a beneficial placebo effect for lower-back pain sufferers who knew the pills they were taking had no active ingredients. What explanation was offered by study authors?
      

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