Prescription Drug Problems
Conditions
Brief summary
Brandeis University and University of South Carolina (USC) have joined together to develop the South Carolina Opioid Safety Initiative - Military (SCOSI-M), to develop an academic detailing (medical education) intervention for physicians and evaluate its effectiveness in a pilot study. The goal of the intervention is to increase the use of safe prescribing and prescription monitoring practices among primary care physicians. The research team will design and pilot an educational intervention for physicians who treat military personnel, veterans, and their families with prescription opioids. The overall aim of SCOSI-M is to prevent the onset or progression of prescription drug problems among Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, military members, and their families who are at high risk for developing problems if their treatment involves long-term use of an opioid.
Interventions
OTHEREducational Intervention
The design is primarily a pre-post, non-equivalent comparison group test of program effectiveness. If final sample size permits, we will examine program effects for each practice environment separately. For measures that require interview data there will be no comparison group data. We will construct matched comparison groups of physicians for each environment for which only secondary data analysis will be conducted. The matched comparison group will be constructed using prescription data from the DoD's pharmacy data transaction system (MACH and DORN VAMC) and from SCRIPTS (community-based physicians and VA prescribers).
Sponsors
University of South Carolina
Medical University of South Carolina
Moncrief Army Community Hospital
William Jennings Bryan Dorn VA Medical Center
Brandeis University
Study design
Allocation
NA
Intervention model
SINGLE_GROUP
Primary purpose
PREVENTION
Masking
NONE
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
18 Years to 85 Years
Healthy volunteers
Yes
Inclusion criteria
1. a physician within one of the 3 practice environments; 2. typically prescribes Schedule II opioids to 10 or more non-cancer pain patients each month; 3. if community office-based, a substantial number of patients must have TRICARE (e.g., 20%); and d) willing to provide written consent for data collection and release of own SCRIPTS data.
Exclusion criteria
1. non-physician providers who report data to the SCRIPTS (dentist, veterinarians, nurses), 2. surgeons, pediatricians, or physicians predominately treating pain in cancer or surgical patients, and, 3. not eligible to register as authorized SCRIPTS user.
Design outcomes
Primary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Use of SCRIPTS | Up to 12 months | Primary outcomes, or effectiveness, will be measured first by the use of SCRIPTS when prescribing opioids (e.g., % of new patients the physician queried; % of patients with long-term use the physician queried). |
Countries
United States
Outcome results
None listed