Addiction, Author Interviews, Opiods / 24.04.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Walter Ling, MD Professor of Psychiatry Director of Integrated Substance Abuse Programs UCLA MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: RECOVER™ is a real-world, observational study looking at long-term recovery in a cohort of 533 people with moderate to severe opioid use disorder (OUD) following their transition from two Phase 3 clinical trials of SUBLOCADE® (buprenorphine extended-release) injection, for subcutaneous use (CIII), into a real-world setting.1 The RECOVER study uses data from three main sources: self-administered assessments from enrolled individuals, urine drug screens (UDS) and data collected from several public sources. Recovery is examined over 24 months – the self-administered assessment and UDS results are completed by participants every three months over the course of this period. Results are being analyzed to understand the clinical, socio-economic and environmental factors associated with continuous effects of medications to treat OUD after a clinical trial.1.2 Studies such as RECOVER can help bridge the knowledge gap between the efficacy of medications as seen in the controlled clinical trial environment, and the use and effect of medications outside of a research setting and their long-term impact on patients’ health. A collaboration between Indivior and the Fralin Biomedical Institute at Virginia Tech Carilion will enable the next phase of the RECOVER study, which may provide further information to health care providers and policymakers on how to use medications to support their patients and how continuity of care can help break down barriers to evidence-based treatment.3  (more…)
Addiction, Annals Internal Medicine, Author Interviews, NIH, Opiods / 10.04.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Nora D. Volkow, MD Director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse National Institutes of Health Bethesda, MD MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? How does vaping, hookah use, inhaled marijuana, smoking etc impact the risk of coronavirus infection?  Could these activities account for some the risks and infections in younger individuals?   Response: Apart from older age, having underlying cardiopulmonary conditions is a known risk factor for the worst clinical course and outcomes of COVID-19, and many of those conditions are known to be caused or exacerbated by smoking. While evidence continues to emerge about how smoking might interact with COVID-19, it is a reasonable assumption that smoking could contribute to risk even in younger individuals. We still don’t know how vaping—whether of nicotine or marijuana or just flavorings—contributes to the risk of infection or illness severity with the virus that causes COVID-19, but there are a number of reasons to be concerned. We have already seen lung illnesses caused by some vaping products, and evidence suggests vaping may disrupt lung epithelial cell function, which in turn increases viral susceptibility and may put individuals at increased risk of infection with the virus that causes COVID-19 or with more severe disease outcomes. Vaping is a relatively new technology, and as such, there are many unknowns. The rapid increases in vaping by young people over the last few years make this an area of concern, and thus an area where more research is urgently needed. (more…)
Addiction, Author Interviews, Cocaine, Opiods, Primary Care / 03.01.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Sarah M. Bagley MD, MSc Assistant Professor of Medicine and Pediatrics Director, CATALYST Clinic Boston University School of Medicine/Boston Medical Center Boston, MA MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Urine drug testing is a routine part of the management of primary care patients with opioid use disorder treated with medications such as buprenorphine. In addition, most providers also ask patients about recent drug use. The point of this study was to see the agreement between the urine drug testing and what patients told a nurse and whether that changed the longer a patient was in treatment. We found that truthful disclosure of opioid and cocaine use increased with time in treatment and that urine drug tests are a useful tool to monitor patients.  (more…)
Author Interviews, NEJM, Pediatrics, Smoking, Tobacco, Tobacco Research, University of Michigan / 30.12.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Richard Miech Ph.D Professor Principal Investigator, Monitoring the Future Institute for Social Research University of Michigan MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?  Response: Every year Monitoring the Future conducts a survey to examine trends in adolescent substance use.  We draw a random sample of schools from a list of all schools in the United States and conduct our survey in ~400 schools.  Our survey is representative of U.S. 8th, 10th, and 12th grade students.  In other words, our results are what you would find if you surveyed every single 8th, 10th, and 12th graders in the United States, within the bounds of a small sampling error of a few percentage points. An increase in vaping is the big news for 2018.  In 10th and 12th grade the increase in nicotine vaping was the largest we've ever seen for any substance in the past 43 years.  As a result of this increase in nicotine vaping, overall use of nicotine increased as well, which suggests that vaping is drawing youth into nicotine use.  We also saw a significant increase in marijuana vaping. (more…)