Doctors warned over pregabalin scripts and overdose deaths: report
Doctors often may not apply the 'same level of caution' with pregabalin as with opioids and benzodiazepines, report states.
A coroner’s court has flagged rising pregabalin-related deaths, saying a “substantial education” effort is still needed for doctors to prescribe the drug safely.
In a report published this month, the court tracked some 5270 overdose deaths in Victoria between 2015 and 2024, showing that the proportion of deaths involving prescription drugs fell from 78% to 69%, a 10-year low.
But the report stressed that, last year, pregabalin was involved in 92 of the 584 deaths resulting from combined drug toxicity.
“This was an unexpected finding, given pregabalin was included in the SafeScript real-time prescription monitoring system [in] July 2023, which was hoped to curb associated harms,” the report said.
