Investigators from University of Pittsburgh Have Reported New Data on Opioids (Explaining Racial-ethnic Disparities In the Receipt of Medication for Opioid Use Disorder During Pregnancy): Opioids

2023 MAR 27 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- Researchers detail new data in Opioids. According to news originating from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, by NewsRx correspondents, research stated, “Factors contributing to racial and ethnic disparities in medication for opioid use disorder (MOUD) receipt during pregnancy are largely unknown. We quantified the contribution of individual, healthcare access and quality, and community factors to racial-ethnic disparities in MOUD during pregnancy and postpartum among Medicaid-enrolled pregnant women with opioid use disorder (OUD).”

Funders for this research include NIH National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), University of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Department of Human Services.

Our news journalists obtained a quote from the research from the University of Pittsburgh, “This retrospective cohort study used regression and non-linear decomposition to examine how individual, healthcare access and quality, and community factors explain racial-ethnic disparities in MOUD receipt among Medicaid-enrolled women with OUD who had a live birth from2011 to 2017. The exposurewas self-reported race and ethnicity. The outcomeswere anyMOUD receipt during pregnancy or postpartum. All factors included were identified from the literature. Racial-ethnic disparities in individual, healthcare access and quality, and community factors explained 15.8% of the racial-ethnic disparity in MOUD receipt during pregnancy and 68.9% of the disparity in the postpartum period. Despite comparable healthcare utilization, non-White/Hispanic women were diagnosed with OUD 37 days later in pregnancy, on average, than non-Hispanic White women, which was the largest contributor to the racial-ethnic disparity in MOUD receipt during pregnancy (111.0%). The racial-ethnic disparity in MOUD receipt during pregnancy was the largest contributor (112.2%) to the racial-ethnic disparity in MOUD in the postpartum period. Later diagnosis of OUD in pregnancy among non-White/Hispanic women partially explains the disparities in MOUD receipt in this population.”

According to the news editors, the research concluded: “Universal substance use screening earlier in pregnancy, combined with connecting patients to evidence-based and culturally competent care, is one approach that could close the observed racial-ethnic disparity in MOUD receipt.”

This research has been peer-reviewed.

For more information on this research see: Explaining Racial-ethnic Disparities In the Receipt of Medication for Opioid Use Disorder During Pregnancy. Journal of Addiction Medicine, 2022;16(6). Journal of Addiction Medicine can be contacted at: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, Two Commerce Sq, 2001 Market St, Philadelphia, PA 19103, USA. (Lippincott Williams and Wilkins - www.lww.com; Journal of Addiction Medicine - http://journals.lww.com/journaladdictionmedicine/pages/default.aspx)

The news correspondents report that additional information may be obtained from Yitong Alice Gao, University of Pittsburgh, Dept. of Health Policy and Management, 4200 Fifth Ave, Pittsburgh, PA 15260, United States. Additional authors for this research include Coleman Drake, Qingwen Chen, Marian P. Jarlenski and Elizabeth E. Krans.

The direct object identifier (DOI) for that additional information is: https://doi.org/10.1097/ADM.0000000000000979. This DOI is a link to an online electronic document that is either free or for purchase, and can be your direct source for a journal article and its citation.

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