Opioid Utilization and Perception of Pain Control in Hospitalized Patients: A Cross-Sectional Study of 11 Sites in 8 Countries
BACKGROUND: Hospitalized patients are frequently treated with opioids for pain control, and receipt of opioids at hospital discharge may increase the risk of future chronic opioid use.
OBJECTIVE: To compare inpatient analgesic prescribing patterns and patients’ perception of pain control in the United States and non-US hospitals. DESIGN: Cross-sectional observational study.
SETTING: Four hospitals in the US and seven in seven other countries.
PARTICIPANTS: Medical inpatients reporting pain.
MEASUREMENTS: Opioid analgesics dispensed during the first 24-36 hours of hospitalization and at discharge; assessments and beliefs about pain.
RESULTS: We acquired completed surveys for 981 patients, 503 of 719 patients in the US and 478 of 590 patients in other countries. After adjusting for confounding factors, we found that more US patients were given opioids during their hospitalization compared with patients in other countries, regardless of whether they did or did not report taking opioids prior to admission (92% vs 70% and 71% vs 41%, respectively; P < .05), and similar trends were seen for opioids prescribed at discharge. Patient satisfaction, beliefs, and expectations about pain control differed between patients in the US and other sites.
LIMITATIONS: Limited number of sites and patients/country.
CONCLUSIONS: In the hospitals we sampled, our data suggest that physicians in the US may prescribe opioids more frequently during patients’ hospitalizations and at discharge than their colleagues in other countries, and patients have different beliefs and expectations about pain control. Efforts to curb the opioid epidemic likely need to include addressing inpatient analgesic prescribing practices and patients’ expectations regarding pain control.
© 2019 Society of Hospital Medicine
Inclusion and Exclusion Criteria
We included patients 18-89 years of age (20-89 in Taiwan because patients under 20 years of age in this country are a restricted group with respect to participating in research), admitted to an internal medicine service from the Emergency Department or Urgent Care clinic with an acute illness for a minimum of 24 hours (with time zero defined as the time care was initiated in the Emergency Department or Urgent Care Clinic), who reported pain at some time during the first 24-36 hours of their hospitalization and who provided informed consent. In the US, “admission” included both observation and inpatient status. We limited the patient population to those admitted via emergency departments and urgent care clinics in order to enroll similar patient populations across sites.
Scheduled admissions, patients transferred from an outside facility, patients admitted directly from a clinic, and those receiving care in intensive care units were excluded. We also excluded patients who were incarcerated, pregnant, those who received major surgery within the previous 14 days, those with a known diagnosis of active cancer, and those who were receiving palliative or hospice care. Patients receiving care from an investigator in the study at the time of enrollment were not eligible due to the potential conflict of interest.
Patient Screening
Primary teams were contacted to determine if any patients on their service might meet the criteria for inclusion in the study on preselected study days chosen on the basis of the research team’s availability. Identified patients were then screened to establish if they met the eligibility criteria. Patients were asked directly if they had experienced pain during their preadmission evaluation or during their hospitalization.
Data Collection
All patients were hospitalized at the time they gave consent and when data were collected. Data were collected via interviews with patients, as well as through chart review. We recorded patients’ age, gender, race, admitting diagnosis(es), length of stay, psychiatric illness, illicit drug use, whether they reported receiving opioid analgesics at the time of hospitalization, whether they were prescribed opioids and/or nonopioid analgesics during their hospitalization, the median and maximum doses of opioids prescribed and dispensed, and whether they were discharged on opioids. The question of illicit drug use was asked of all patients with the exception of those hospitalized in South Korea due to potential legal implications.
Opioid prescribing and receipt of opioids was recorded based upon current provider orders and medication administration records, respectively. Perception of and satisfaction with pain control was assessed with the American Pain Society Patient Outcome Questionnaire–Modified (APS-POQ-Modified).24,25 Versions of this survey have been validated in English as well as in other languages and cultures.26-28 Because hospitalization practices could differ across hospitals and in different countries, we compared patients’ severity of illness by using Charlson comorbidity scores. Consent forms and the APS-POQ were translated into each country’s primary language according to established processes.29 The survey was filled out by having site investigators read questions aloud and by use of a large-font visual analog scale to aid patients’ verbal responses.
Data were collected and managed using a secure, web-based application electronic data capture tool (Research Electronic Data Capture [REDCap], Nashville, Tennessee), hosted at Denver Health.30
