"We are overreacting to the need to lower opioid prescribing by punishing patients," says Dr. Kelly Pfeifer.
Now that President Trump has officially declared the opioid crisis a national emergency, data can inform how to properly tackle the problem, community by community.
The California Supreme Court just armed would be challengers to the state’s prescription drug tracking system. And defanging the system would have an impact on patient safety.
Does the California Medical Board have the right to check records to see if a doctor is recklessly prescribing drugs? For the past three years, that question has been stuck in the courts.
The tendency to blame the patient in the wake of deaths or complications often serves to obscure mistakes made by health care providers.
Española, New Mexico, has had one of the highest rates of heroin addiction in the country for decades. It’s a public health crisis that can create particular challenges for pregnant moms and their doctors.
Doctors are famously busy. Would having their staff run checks of patients’ prescription histories instead make drug-tracking databases more effective?
How do we begin to solve the prescription drug crisis ravaging communities across the country? A recent report points the way to promising solutions, including some that should've been implemented years ago.
Opioid addiction has claimed thousands of lives in San Diego County. Understanding who is dying and how addiction has changed over the last 15 years is central to confronting the addiction epidemic.
Just before President Obama announced a new set of new initiatives to boost access to addiction treatment this week, a four-part series on NPR looked at the opioid epidemic's smallest victims, and what can be done to improve their care.
