Prescription Drug Deaths Increase Dramatically

Excerpts Courtesy of Scientific American

The number of deaths and hospitalizations caused by prescription drugs has risen precipitously in the past decade, according to a new study in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

For prescription opioids, sedatives and tranquilizers—commonly prescribed for pain management—the number of hospitalizations for poisonings increased 65 percent between 1999 and 2006 (the first and last years, respectively, for which data were comparable and collected). The number of hospitalizations for all poisonings, including illegal drugs, other prescription medications and miscellaneous substances, increased during this time period as well, but that jump (33 percent) was about half the rate of those for the prescription pain drugs.

Many experts think that the sheer prevalence of many of these drugs recently has contributed to the drastic increase in poisonings. Although growing illegal markets and distribution of these drugs might be a driving factor in their increasingly large role in poisonings and deaths, perfectly legal prescriptions are probably playing a role as well.

"I think the whole issue of the availability of these drugs and whether they're being over-prescribed" should be investigated, says Susan Baker, a professor at Johns Hopkins Center for Injury Research and Policy.

Many people do rely on pharmacological treatment for withdrawal, anxiety or chronic pain, but when communities have access to an overabundance of these medications, abuse appears to become more likely. If doctors prescribe too much medication or too many refills, excess drugs "are going to be sitting in people's medicine cabinets for someone else to take advantage of," Baker explains.

Although the new report details the stark increase in the reported poisoning data, the true number of deaths and hospitalizations in which prescription drugs have played a role might be even higher, the researchers pointed out. The new analysis assessed cases only in which prescription drug overdose was listed as the primary diagnosis. Some prescription drug–related hospitalizations might be classified under other primary categories.

"I don't have any sense that it's getting any better," Coben says. With drug companies reporting strong overall sales (including a 5.1 percent increase in U.S. sales in 2009 to $300.3 billion for 3.9 billion individual retail prescriptions), in fact, the problem might be getting worse.

The researchers noted that the details surrounding these hundreds of thousands of overdoses are unknown. The medical data used for the analysis did not include full toxicology reports that would reveal drug-drug interactions.

Steve - shocking numbers, but not surprising. This piece appeared in Scientific American, but could hardly be found anywhere else in mainstream media. Shocking, but not surprising either.