Drug Diversion in the Anesthesia Profession

Preventing Prescription Drug Diversion.

THE FACTS In 2013, more than 43,900 Americans died from drug overdose. Prescription drugs contributed to most of those deaths. Opioid pain relievers like oxycodone, hydrocodone, and methadone were involved in more than 16,000 of those deaths (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2015). Approximately 46 Americans die every day from drug overdoses (Jones, Mack, & Paulozzi, 2013). Opi...

Smart marketing may improve public understanding of the anesthesia profession

BACKGROUND A 2005 survey led by the Israeli Society of Anesthesiologists (ISA) found that large parts of the Israeli public are not familiar with the profession of anesthesia. The ISA has subsequently been conducting a public campaign for several years with the aim to enhance community knowledge regarding the anesthesiologists' training and their critical role in the perioperative period. OBJ...

Drug chirality in anesthesia.

MORE than one-third of all synthetic drugs are chiral and are marketed as racemates, 1:1 mixtures of two types of molecules bearing identical chemical constitution and atomic connections but with a different spatial orientation of their constituent atoms. Drug receptors may discriminate between stereoisomers in several ways; binding may favor one form over the other, and to a degree varying wit...

Opioid therapy and prescription drug diversion.

Adverse drug interactions in anesthesia.

Anesthesia often involves the administration of several drugs belonging to different classes. In addition, many patients will be taking a number of drugs related to their surgical condition or for other medical diseases. Thus, there is a considerable potential for drug interactions in the perioperative period, some of which may be potentially harmful to patients. The most common interactions in...