In 2020, over 142 million opioid prescriptions were dispensed in the U.S., and over 16,000 people died from opioid related overdoses.
The rate of unintentional prescription opioid overdose may decrease with more informed decision-making during the prescribing process.
Bamboo Health’s NarxCare® is a platform with analytics to support review of PDMP data and provide clinical resources for patient support. The solution automatically analyzes a patient’s PDMP data and provides interactive visualizations of usage patterns of opioids, sedatives, and stimulants and risk scores to help identify potential risk factors.
In a recent independent, peer-reviewed study conducted through the National Institute on Drug Abuse’s (NIDA) National Drug Abuse Treatment Clinical Trials Network (CTN) and funded by the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) HEAL Initiative, NarxCare was concluded to be an effective “initial prescription opioid-risk platform.”
The study evaluated the validity of the NarxCare Narcotic Score as a clinical measure of potential unintentional opioid overdose and via researchers’ assessment of NarxCare risk thresholds relative to the “gold standard” World Health Organization Alcohol, Smoking, and Substance Involvement Screening Test (WHO ASSIST).
Overview:
1,523 – The study assessed 1,523 participants who were picking up prescribed opioids.
19 – The study involved 19 Kroger community pharmacies located in both urban and rural Ohio and Indiana.
3 – The study used narcotic scores to divide participants into three groups representing low-, moderate- and high-risk for unintentional overdose. The thresholds proved clinically useful as a platform to advise providers on next steps with the patient, such as further review of the data or an additional discussion with the patient.
Conclusions:
- NarxCare provides prescribers and dispensers with clinical decision support to assess a patient’s vulnerability to unintentional opioid overdose death.
- Customers and clinician users should use NarxCare and the PDMP to support their clinical decisions, not displace them.
- Pharmacists and physicians can use the thresholds as indicators to potentially further review details in the patient’s prescription history in conjunction with other relevant patient health information as they attend to the patients.
Bamboo Health’s PDMP solutions are used in more than 40 states and territories and are leading the nation in prescription data monitoring. We are encouraged by the results of this peer-reviewed study, as well as others, which have confirmed NarxCare’s ability to provide prescribers with clinical decision support to assess a patient’s vulnerability to unintentional opioid overdose. By helping clinicians and pharmacists make more informed prescribing and dispensing decisions, NarxCare is enabling improved patient safety and health outcomes.
