Amid opioid epidemic, dentists rethink painkiller prescriptions

Dentists have long been frequent prescribers of immediate-release opioids like Vicodin and Percocet for the pain from tooth extractions, but many in the field are now reassessing their prescribing habits, with state dental boards and associations issuing new guidelines for patients and practitioners (Source: “Dentists Work To Ease Patients’ Pain With Fewer Opioids,” Kaiser Health News, March 8, 2017).

For many patients, these drugs never pose a problem. But the deaths of some 165,000 people in the U.S. in the past 15 years involving an overdose of heroin or opioids, and the many other people struggling with addiction, have led officials to consider ways to curtail their use.

A 2011 study in the Journal of the American Dental Association estimates that dentists are responsible for 12 percent of prescriptions for fast-acting opioid pain relievers — just below general practitioners and internal medicine doctors as top prescribers of common opioids.