Bringing big data to bear on the opioid crisis

As the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention project that more than 1,000 people are treated everyday as a result of prescription opioid misuse, and the New York Times reports that drug overdose becomes the leading cause of death of Americans younger than 50 years of age, research from CVS Health Research Institute and Johns Hopkins University is looking at how algorithms can be used to help identify signs of patients misusing and abusing opioids.

The study looked at 15 algorithms that use e-prescriptions and/or medical claims to assess and track habits associated with patients who are pharmacy or doctor shopping, or those who seek prescriptions that aren’t medically necessary. The results, published in the Journal of American Medical Informatics, concluded that using these algorithms can help single out both patients and providers that require additional screening or pharmacy-based interventions for further evaluation of prescription drug misuse.

“As healthcare payers seek to both improve patients’ health and minimize fraud and waste, these data-driven approaches are applicable and beneficial to real-world, population-level surveillance. [They are] critical to targeting patient outreach and intervention, as well as minimizing provider fraud,” said Dr. Troyen Brennan, CVS Health chief medical officer and co-author of the study.