CHICAGO, May 2 (Xinhua) -- An equal number of blacks and whites, approximately 23 percent, received opioid prescriptions in 2015, which suggests that doctors are no longer discriminating against blacks when prescribing narcotics for pain relief, University of Michigan (UM) researchers found in a study.
Wanting to know whether racial and ethnic disparities in how pain is managed have changed in recent years, the researchers looked at prescription data from people who reported moderate to severe noncancer pain in the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey from 2000-2015.
"Our findings suggest, however, a persistent reliance on opioids across all racial, ethnic groups," said first author Jordan Harrison, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Pennsylvania who received her doctorate from UM's School of Nursing, in a news release published on UM website Tuesday.
Also worth noting is the use of opioids relative to nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDS) among blacks and whites, use of NSAIDS is higher among blacks.
The study did not examine why more blacks are now using prescription opioids, but the change could partially reflect gains in public insurance coverage since 2010. However, all racial and ethnic groups experienced similar declines in private health insurance coverage.
After adjusting for age and sex, prescription opioid use increased across all racial and ethnic groups over the study period, with the greatest increases of 78 percent among whites. Hispanics appear to use opioids less than other groups, with about 15 percent using opioids over time. This is about the same as the number of Hispanics getting NSAIDS.
Overall, the researchers found that 30 to 35 percent of American adults who have pain received a pain medication of some kind over the 15-year period, regardless of ethnicity.
As the number of prescriptions for opiates increased across the board, the use of NSAIDS, say Motrin and Aleve, also increased overall. Use of muscle relaxers and Cox-2 inhibitors, say Celebrex and Vioxx decreased.
