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Showing posts with label fentanyl. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fentanyl. Show all posts
Sunday, June 1, 2025
Thursday, September 19, 2019
Health-care providers hold biases based on
sexual orientation, study says
Findings highlight need for more training of
providers in cultural sensitivity
University of Washington Health Sciences/UW Medicine
In the first study that looks at a variety of health-care providers and their implicit attitudes towards lesbian women and gay men, researchers found there is widespread implicit bias toward lesbian women and gay men. The study finds that moderate to strong implicit preferences for straight people over lesbian and gay people are widespread among heterosexual providers.
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| Learn about the unique stress and traumas faced by LGBTQ youth. |
Findings highlight need for more training of providers in cultural sensitivity
University of Washington Health Sciences/UW Medicine
In the first study that looks at a variety of health-care providers and their implicit attitudes towards lesbian women and gay men, researchers found there is widespread implicit bias toward lesbian women and gay men. The study finds that moderate to strong implicit preferences for straight people over lesbian and gay people are widespread among heterosexual providers.
In the first study that looks at a variety of healthcare providers and their implicit attitudes towards lesbian women and gay men, researchers found there is widespread implicit bias toward lesbian women and gay men.
The study, "Health care providers' implicit and explicit attitudes toward lesbian women and gay men," published in the American Journal of Public Health finds that moderate to strong implicit preferences for straight people over lesbian and gay people are widespread among heterosexual providers. Also lesbian and gay health providers expressed implicit and explicit preferences for lesbian and gay people over straight people. Bisexual providers were found to have mixed preferences, mental health providers held the weakest implicit bias for heterosexual people over lesbian and gay people and nurses held the strongest implicit bias for heterosexual people over lesbian and gay people.
In short, healthcare providers, similar to others in society, hold a bias for people who shared their own sexual identity.
Lead researcher, Janice Sabin, UW research associate professor in biomedical informatics and medical education, said that clinical care of the LGBT population is a somewhat neglected area in curriculum in nursing, medicine and other areas of healthcare education.
"We want all providers to be proficient in treating diverse populations, including the LGBT population," she said.
Rachel G. Riskind with the Department of Psychology at Guilford College in Greensboro, N.C., and Brian A. Nosek with the Department of Psychology at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, were co-authors on the study.
Researchers used results from the Sexuality Implicit Association Test developed to assess presence of implicit bias towards either heterosexual or homosexual individuals. The test captured demographic data and implicit association test results for more than 200,000 participants between May 2006 and December 2012. Test takers were asked to indicate their explicit preferences towards heterosexual, lesbian and gay people by endorsing statements ranging from "I strongly prefer straight people to gay people to "I strongly prefer gay people to straight people." The study categorized healthcare respondents by their profession ¬¬¬-- medical doctor, nurse, mental health provider, other treatment provider or non-provider --to assess attitudes specifically from healthcare providers.
Test takers voluntarily accessed the Sexuality Implicit Association Test on Project Implicit, a non-profit organization founded in 1998 by three scientists -- Tony Greenwald (University of Washington), Mahzarin Banaji (Harvard University), and Brian Nosek (University of Virginia). Project Implicit provides a "virtual laboratory" for collecting data on the Internet in a mission to educate the public about hidden biases or thoughts and feelings outside of conscious awareness and control.
Sabin said, "training for healthcare providers about treating sexual minority patients is an area in great need of attention."
"For healthcare organizations that aim to serve these populations, these data suggest an opportunity to examine methods likely to mitigate implicit biases, such as eliminating discretion from decision-making, use of clinical guidelines, awareness of personal bias as self-caution, organizational policies that promote objective decision-making, and inclusion of counter-stereotypical experiences in educational programs," the authors conclude.
While this study found implicit bias among healthcare providers, Sabin said future research should examine how providers' implicit and explicit preferences toward sexual orientation affect delivery of care to members of sexual minority populations.
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| Learn about the unique stress and traumas faced by LGBTQ youth. |
Saturday, August 31, 2019
Tyler Skagg's Death: Behind the Exploding Opioid Crisis
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| How drugs affect the brain in deadly ways. Click here. |
August 29, 2019
August 29, 2019
RAND Corporation
The sudden appearance of the drug fentanyl in the US has driven up overdose deaths dramatically, even as the abuse of heroin and other opioids has shown signs of stabilizing. In the most-comprehensive analysis yet of the crisis, researchers urge that innovative new strategies be pursued because the epidemic is unlike others that have struck the nation.
FULL STORY
The U.S. overdose crisis worsened dramatically with the arrival of synthetic opioids like fentanyl -- now responsible for tens of thousands of deaths annually -- and the problem requires innovative new strateges because the epidemic is unlike others that have struck the nation, according to a new RAND Corporation study.
"This crisis is different because the spread of synthetic opioids is largely driven by suppliers' decisions, not by user demand," said Bryce Pardo, lead author of the study and an associate policy researcher at RAND, a nonprofit research organization. "Most people who use opioids are not asking for fentanyl and would prefer to avoid exposure."
While fentanyl had appeared in U.S. illicit drug markets before, production was limited to one or a few capable chemists, and bottlenecks in production and distribution slowed the drug's diffusion. Law enforcement was able to detect and shut down illicit manufacture to contain these outbreaks.
RAND researchers found that today's synthetic opioid surge is fueled by multiple sources. Mexican drug trafficking organizations smuggle fentanyl into the U.S., and China's pharmaceutical and chemical industries are inadequately regulated, allowing producers to advertise and ship synthetic opioids to buyers anywhere in the world.
While traditional criminal organizations play a role in the spread of fentanyl, the internet also has made it easier to traffic these drugs and to share information about their synthesis.
Overdose deaths involving fentanyl and other synthetic opioids have increased from about 3,000 in 2013 to more than 30,000 in 2018. These deaths have remained concentrated in Appalachia, the mid-Atlantic and New England.
"While synthetic opioids have not yet become entrenched in illicit drug markets west of the Mississippi River, authorities must remain vigilant," said Jirka Taylor, study co-author and senior policy analyst at RAND. "Even delaying the onset in these markets by a few years could save thousands of lives."
For U.S. policymakers, nontraditional strategies may be required to address this new challenge. The researchers avoid making specific policy recommendations, but advocate consideration of a broad array of innovative approaches such as supervised consumption sites, creative supply disruption, drug content testing, and increasing access to novel treatments that are available in other countries, such as heroin-assisted treatment.
"Indeed, it might be that the synthetic opioid problem will eventually be resolved with approaches or technologies that do not currently exist or have yet to be tested," said Beau Kilmer, study co-author and director of the RAND Drug Policy Research Center. "Limiting policy responses to existing approaches will likely be insufficient and may condemn many people to early deaths."
RAND researchers say that since the diffusion of fentanyl is driven by suppliers' decisions, it makes sense to consider supply disruption as one piece of a comprehensive response, particularly where that supply is not yet firmly entrenched.
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| How drugs affect the brain in deadly ways. Click here. |
Friday, March 2, 2018
Pain, Chronic Pain, and Opioids
Pain: What is it and how do you treat it?
Chronic pain is recognized by the World Health Organization as a leading medical issue, worldwide.
Pain also has been called a first possible step on the road to opioid addiction. A slip, a broken limb followed by a prescription to oxycontin or other powerful opioid, misuse of that prescription, and the path to heroin or fentanyl abuse can easily start.
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| Learn about the brain. Click here. |
Pain is an unpleasant sensation and emotional experience linked to tissue damage. Its purpose is to allow the body to react and prevent further tissue damage.
We feel pain when a signal is sent through nerve fibers to the brain for interpretation.
The experience of pain is different for everyone, and there are different ways of feeling and describing pain. This can makes it difficult to define and treat.
Pain can be short-term or long-term, it can stay in one place, or it can spread around the body.
Fast facts on pain:
--Pain results from tissue damage.
--It is a part of the body's defense mechanism. --It warns us to take action to prevent further tissue damage.
--People experience and describe pain differently, and this makes it hard to diagnose.
--A range of medications and other treatments can help relieve pain, depending on the cause.
Pain chronic, acute
Pain chronic, acute
Pain can be chronic or acute and take a variety of forms and severities.
Pain is felt when special nerves that detect tissue damage send signals to transmit information about the damage along the spinal cord to the brain. These nerves are known as nociceptors.
The brain then decides what to do about the pain.
For example, if you touch a hot surface, a message will travel through a reflex arc in the spinal cord and cause an immediate contraction of the muscles. This contraction will pull your hand away from the hot surface.
This happens so fast that the message doesn't even reach the brain. However, the pain message will continue to the brain. Once there, it will cause an unpleasant sensation of pain to be felt.
How an individual's brain interprets these signals and the efficiency of the communication channel between the nociceptors and the brain dictate how people feel pain.
Source: Medical News Today
By Adam Felman
Reviewed by Deborah Weatherspoon, PhD, RN, CRNAThursday, December 21, 2017
Opioid crisis cuts U.S. life expectancy
The opioid crisis is rippling through the U.S. healthcare system, causing a spike in rates of hepatitis C related to increased opioid injections and reducing overall life expectancy among Americans, which has fallen for the second year in a row, U.S. health officials said.
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| Addiction is a brain disease. Learn about it in clear language. |
Heroin, an illegal opioid that is typically injected, accounted for around 15,500 deaths, and prescription painkillers were involved in about 14,500, the CDC reported.
“These are not simply numbers - these are actual lives,” said Benjamin F. Miller, chief policy officer of Well Being Trust, a non-profit foundation focused on mental health issues. “Seeing the loss of life at this dramatic rate calls for more immediate action.”
President Donald Trump in October declared the opioid crisis a public health emergency, which senior administration officials said would redirect federal resources and loosen regulations to combat abuse of the drugs. However, he stopped short of declaring a national emergency, a move he had promised months before and which would have freed up more federal money.
Overdose rates rose in 40 states and in Washington, D.C., between 2015 and 2016, with 17 states seeing increases of 25 percent or more, according to the TFAH analysis.
“Every community has been impacted by this crisis,” Auerbach said, adding that the government was not making the investments needed to “turn the tide.”
The surge in overdose deaths has depressed recent gains in U.S. life expectancy, which fell to an average age of 78.6, down 0.1 year from 2015 and marking the first two-year drop since 1962-1963.
In a separate report, the CDC linked the recent steep increases in hepatitis C infections to increases in opioid injection.
Researchers used a national database that tracks substance abuse admissions to treatment facilities in all 50 U.S. states. They found a 133 percent increase in acute hepatitis C cases that coincided with a 93 percent increase in admissions for opioid injection between 2004 to 2014.
“Hepatitis C is a deadly, common, and often invisible result of America’s opioid crisis,” said Dr. Jonathan Mermin, director of CDC’s National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention. Mermin urged testing people who inject drugs for hepatitis C infection to prevent new transmissions.
As the opioid epidemic has worsened, many state attorneys general have sued makers of these drugs as they investigate whether manufacturers and distributors engaged in unlawful marketing behavior.
Reuters, Inc.
Thursday, December 7, 2017
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