Risk of addiction higher in month after opioid initiation compared with long-term use, Aussie research suggests
Lead researcher Dr Chrianna Bharat says there was a dose-response relationship between exposure and risk of opioid use disorder.
Patients who have initiated opioids in the previous month are at a higher risk of an opioid use disorder diagnosis compared with patients who have used them long-term, preliminary findings suggest.
UNSW-led researchers have compared patterns of opioid exposure and the risk of developing an opioid use disorder (OUD) among 2.5 million NSW adults who initiated a prescription opioid between 2003 and 2017.
Around 11,800 developed OUD — identified by a hospital diagnosis or initiation of an opioid agonist treatment — over the study, at a mean age 29.
The median time from initiating an opioid script to an OUD diagnosis was four years.
