Short-Acting Opioids for Withdrawal May Keep Patients From Leaving Hospital Early

Undertreatment of opioid withdrawal symptoms has been associated with early patient-directed discharge, which, in turn, is linked to higher rates of mortality, readmission, and overdose.A retrospective study suggested that each doubling of the daily dose of short-acting opioids for withdrawal symptoms was associated with an 8% reduction in the hazard of early patient-directed discharge.Future studies should examine the unintended consequences of using short-acting opioids for withdrawal symptoms, including the potential for "outcompeting" buprenorphine or methadone initiation.

Treating opioid withdrawal with short-acting opioids showed a dose-dependent association with a reduction in early patient-directed discharge in hospitalized adults receiving medications for opioid use disorder (OUD), according to a retrospective cohort study.

In the final adjusted model of 669 hospitalizations representing 520 patients, each doubling of the daily dose of short-acting opioids was associated with an 8% reduction in the hazard of early patient-directed discharge (adjusted HR 0.92, 95% CI 0.86-0.99, P=0.03), reported Alexander Logan, MD, of the University of California San Francisco, and co-authors in JAMA Network Open.