Opioid Prescriptions for Chronic Pain and Overdose

Long-term opioid therapy for chronic noncancer pain is becoming increasingly common in community practice. Concomitant with this change in practice, rates of fatal opioid overdose have increased. The extent to which overdose risks are elevated among patients receiving medically prescribed long-term opioid therapy is unknown.

To estimate rates of opioid overdose and their association with an average prescribed daily opioid dose among patients receiving medically prescribed, long-term opioid therapy.