Management of Patients on Abuse-Deterrent Opioids in the Ambulatory Surgery Setting.

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: The use of prescription opioids for acute and chronic pain has become more prevalent than ever, and concurrent with the increased prescribing of opioids, there has been a steady increase in opioid abuse. Abuse is commonly associated with physical or chemical manipulation of the original opiate to provide more rapid onset of the active ingredient. RECENT FINDINGS: This growing national public health concern has led to the development of various abuse-deterring opioids with the intent of decreasing the diversion of opioids from their prescribed use. Given the ever-increasing percentage of surgeries performed in the ambulatory surgery setting, anesthesia providers will inevitably encounter more and more patients taking these new opioid formulations with abuse-deterring properties. Consequently, a thorough understanding of these medications is vital for optimal anesthetic management. This article reviews the scope of the problem of prescription opiate abuse, summarizes the currently available abuse-deterring opioids, and discusses the anesthetic management of patients who are taking these new medications in the outpatient setting.

Functional Connectivity Alterations: Novel Therapy and Future Implications in Chronic Pain Management.

BACKGROUND: Chronic pain is a major public health problem resulting in physical and emotional pain for individuals and families, loss of productivity, and an annual cost of billions of dollars. The lack of objective measures available to aid in diagnosis and evaluation of therapies for chronic pain continues to be a challenge for the clinician. OBJECTIVES: Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is an imaging technique that can establish regional areas of interest and examine synchronous neuronal activity in functionally related but anatomically distinct regions of the brain, known as functional connectivity. STUDY DESIGN: The present investigation examines changes in functional connectivity in 4 common pain syndromes: chronic back pain (CBP), fibromyalgia, diabetic neuropathy, and complex regional pain syndrome (CRPS). SETTING: This is a review of the current understanding of functional connectivity. METHODS: Utilizing functional imaging, patients with these conditions have been shown to have significant structural and functional differences when compared to healthy controls. RESULTS: Functional connectivity, therefore, has the potential to assist in diagnostic classification of different pain conditions, predict individual responses to specific therapeutic interventions, and serve as a gateway for personalized medicine. Indirect activation of brain activity can be seen by the blood flow to the brain at specific sites, with chronic pain patients having increased brain activity. LIMITATIONS: The present investigation is limited in that few studies have examined this relatively new modality. CONCLUSIONS: Knowing and observing the brain's activity as related to pain gives pain patients an opportunity to decrease pain-related brain activity and decrease severe chronic pain. This modality can be used along with interventional pain management techniques in order to provide optimum pain relief. KEY WORDS: Functional connectivity, fMRI, chronic pain, chronic back pain, fibromyalgia, diabetic neuropathy, chronic regional pain syndrome.

Consensus Statement for Clinical Pathway Development for Perioperative Pain Management and Care Transitions.

The perioperative surgical home (PSH) model has been created with the intention to reduce costs and to improve efficiency of care and patient experience in the perioperative period. The PSH is a comprehensive model of care that is team-based and patient-centric. The team in each facility should be multidisciplinary and include the input of perioperative services leadership, surgical services, and support personnel in order to provide seamless care for the patient from the preoperative period when decision to undergo surgery is initially made to discharge and, if needed after discharge from the hospital, until full recovery is achieved. PSH is discussed in this consensus article with the emphasis on perioperative care coordination of patients with chronic pain conditions. Preoperative optimization can be successfully undertaken through patient evaluation, screening, and education. Many important positive implications in the PSH model, in particular for those patients with increased potential morbidity, mortality, and high-risk populations, including those with a history of substance abuse or anxiety, reflect a more modern approach to health care. Newer strategies, such as preemptive and multimodal analgesic techniques, have been demonstrated to reduce opioid consumption and to improve pain relief. Continuous catheters, ketamine, methadone, buprenorphine, and other modalities can be best delivered with the expertise of an anesthesiologist and a support team, such as an acute pain care coordinator. A physician-led PSH is a model of care that is patient-centered with the integration of care from multiple disciplines and is ideally suited for leadership from the anesthesia team. Optimum pain control will have a significant positive impact on the measures of the PSH, including lowering of complication rates, lowering of readmissions, improved patient satisfaction, reduced morbidity and mortality, and shortening of hospital stays. All stakeholders should work together and consider the PSH model to ensure the best quality of health care for patients undergoing surgery in the future. The pain management physician's role in the postoperative period should be focused on providing optimal analgesia associated with improved patient satisfaction and outcomes that result in reduced health care costs.