AIM Experimental pain models may help to evaluate the mechanisms of analgesics and target the clinical indications for their use. This review, the second in a series of two, addresses how the efficacy of non-opioid analgesics have been assessed in human volunteers using experimental pain models. METHODS A literature search was completed for randomized controlled studies that included human ex...

Over the past two decades, a steeply growing number of persons with chronic non-cancer pain have been using opioid analgesics chronically to treat it, accompanied by a markedly increased prevalence of individuals with opioid-related misuse, opioid use disorders, emergency department visits, hospitalizations, admissions to drug treatment programs, and drug overdose deaths. This opioid misuse and...

OBJECTIVE Due to the high prevalence of prescription opioid misuse, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) mandated a Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy (REMS) requiring manufacturers of extended-release/long-acting (ER/LA) opioid analgesics to fund continuing education based on a FDA Blueprint. This article describes the Safe and Competent Opioid Prescribing Education (SCOPE of Pain) p...

Pain is a protective warning sign activated by tissue damage during different pathological processes. The clinical manifestation of pain is individual, multifactorial and very complex and requires the implementation of sound pharmacological approaches. The treatment of odontogenic pain is focused not only in the relief of pain but also in the suppression of causes of pain, mainly the inflammati...

BackgroundIn the context of opioid epidemic, a limited but growing body literature has found state medical marijuana laws (MMLs) to be associated with lower levels prescribing. However, robust evidence linking MMLs individual-level opioid-related outcomes is lacking, particularly among women. This finding especially true for pregnant and parenting women, who have been disproportionately affecte...

Previous studies have demonstrated that prolonged morphine treatment in vivo induces the translocation of delta opioid receptors (deltaORs) from intracellular compartments to neuronal plasma membranes and this trafficking event is correlated with an increased functional competence of the receptor. The mechanism underlying this phenomenon is unknown; however chronic morphine treatment has been s...

In this prospective, observational study we explored whether A118G single nucleotide polymorphism in the human mu-opioid receptor (MOR) gene could explain the inter-individual differences in opioid analgesic requirements in patients with acute postoperative pain and chronic pain. The frequency of the wild-type A118 MOR (major) and variant G118 MOR (minor) alleles in the subjects with chronic, n...

Respiratory depression is a therapy-limiting side effect of opioid analgesics, yet our understanding of the brain circuits mediating this potentially lethal outcome remains incomplete. Here we studied the contribution of the rostral ventromedial medulla (RVM), a region long implicated in pain modulation and homeostatic regulation, to opioid-induced respiratory depression. Microinjection of the ...

40 Respiratory depression is a therapy-limiting side-effect of opioid analgesics, yet our 41 understanding of the brain circuits mediating this potentially lethal outcome remains incomplete. 42 Here we studied the contribution of the rostral ventromedial medulla (RVM), a region long 43 implicated in pain modulation and homeostatic regulation, to opioid-induced respiratory 44 depression. Microin...