Search Strategy: Opioid Crisis

Search Strategy: Opioid Crisis

Topic Search Strategy

Clinical Question

The opioid crisis that exists today can be traced back close to 30 years (Rummans, Burton & Dawson, 2018). Several reasons can be associated with the epidemic. However, the root cause of the situation is the misuse of the drug that came from its increased prescription to treat suffering and pain. It severe cases, this addiction has led to death. The prescription increased because of the change in use for opioids. They were no longer used for acute and terminal pain alone, but any conditions with pain manifestations (Rummans et al., 2018). This has led to increased misuse and addiction to opioids among people nowadays. To manage this crisis, several issues should be considered. There is a need to engage various disciplines to formulate an approach that focuses on education, training, and research to address the problem of opioids addiction and misuse.

The main problem is an addiction and misuse of opioids, which has resulted from the underuse of appropriate medical interventions to curb the long-lasting epidemic. The American Academy of Family Physicians reports that by 2025, the number of deaths from opioids misuses and addiction could hit 82,000 if the situation is not managed (Rummans et al., 2018). A strict judicious directive on the prescription of the drug can address the problem. Besides, there is a dire need to move out of the notion of over-emphasizing on medical interventions to respond to the crisis.

A PICOT will be used to assist in the collection of research data for this project. The population for the study will be nurses, recovered patients, and other stakeholders aware of the opioid crisis, or have dealt with opioid patients. The intervention would be methods other than the traditional medical approaches. These methods include patient education and training. The comparison would be between the efficacy of the new interventions and the conventional therapeutic approach.  The desired outcome is to improve the quality and effectiveness of care to opioid patients. Time is the amount of duration enough to educate and train opioid patients on pain and suffering management. The PICOT question is, ‘Do patient education and training affect the efficiency and quality of care to opioid patients?’ That leads to the purpose of this paper, which is to assess the efficiency of patient training and education on opioid management.

Level of Evidence

The research question that was asked during this study is analytical since it relates an intervention to an outcome. The question was, ‘What is the effect of patient education and training in the treatment of opioid addiction?’ It is essential to gather the information that is backed by evidence to complete any research work (Grove & Gray, 2018). The mixed research method was used to collect such information. A qualitative design was adopted to collect data directly about the experiences of nurses, patients, and stakeholders concerning the opioid treatment options. A quantitative approach will be useful in the analysis of the relation between two variables; efficacy of patient training and education and medical interventions in treating opioids dependence and addiction. This relationship will be established by statistical data hence the quantitative approach.

Search Strategy

While searching for the articles about my topic, the search term included the following statement, ‘effective interventions for opioid addiction and misuse,’ ‘improved patient care for opioid patients,’ and patient education v ‘medical therapies for opioid misuse and dependence’ The search database used initially was PubMed then Google Scholar after which I searched on Chamberlain Library. The search was confined by the boundaries defined by the PICOT question, which led to making several necessary decisions to remain on course with the aim of the research.

At the start of the search, I used search topic opioid addiction treatment and management. This gave results of several articles, which influenced the decision to be more specific with the search considering the research problem and purpose. I chose patient education and training as a particular topic of search in Chamberlain Library to make the choice of articles easier. The selection was influenced by a date filter, which saw only peer-reviewed articles chosen. They also had to be relevant articles published within the previous five years.  The relevance was in the sense that all articles had to be about nursing.

After a thorough search of relevant articles, these two were chosen for references and guidance to the project: Primary care-based models for the treatment of opioid use disorder: A scoping review by P. Todd Korthuis, Dennis McCarty, Melissa Weimer, Christina Bougatsos, Ian Blazina, Bernadette Zakher, Sara Grusing, Beth Devine and Roger Chou, and Pharmacist utilization of prescription opioid misuse interventions: Acceptability among pharmacists and patients by Riley TB and Alemagno S.

The article Primary care-based models for the treatment of opioid use disorder: A scoping review outlines the models of opioid medications using different models. This article also settles on the most effective models other than medical interventions. The education and training about opioid management are well discussed and its importance over medical treatments. The other article describes the interventions that both patients and pharmacists find acceptable. The first article is based on the nurse while the other on both patients and nurses, which is also a reason for their selection. This is because the information is required about patients, nurses, and other stakeholders about opioid treatment efficiency by interventions other than medicines.

In conclusion, to obtain research information about the topic, it is essential to formulate a PICOT question, which focuses on the research problem. Besides, a mixed research method and other evidence-based scholarly articles can be used to complete the group project in the easiest way possible.

References

Rummans, T. A., Burton, M. C., & Dawson, N. L. (2018, March). How good intentions contributed to bad outcomes: the opioid crisis. In Mayo Clinic Proceedings (Vol. 93, No. 3, pp. 344-350). Elsevier. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29502564

Grove, S. K., & Gray, J. R. (2018). Understanding Nursing Research E-Book: Building an Evidence-Based Practice. Elsevier Health Sciences.

Korthuis, P. T., McCarty, D., Weimer, M., Bougatsos, C., Blazina, I., Zakher, B., & Chou, R. (2017). Primary care-based models for the treatment of opioid use disorder: A scoping review. Annals of internal medicine, 166(4), 268-278. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5504692/

Riley, T. B., & Alemagno, S. (2019). Pharmacist utilization of prescription opioid misuse interventions: Acceptability among pharmacists and patients. Research in Social and Administrative Pharmacy, 15(8), 986-991. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30665825