Opioid prescriptions up across country, but daily doses dispensed down: report
TORONTO — The overall number of prescriptions for opioids has increased over the last five years, but doctors have been giving patients fewer doses at one time, a report by the Canadian Institute for Health Information has found.
The report, released Wednesday, shows the number of opioid prescriptions rose by almost seven per cent between 2012 and 2016, while daily doses on average dropped by five per cent — to 226 million from 238 million.
Last year, 21.5 million prescriptions for the potent painkillers were dispensed, up from 20.2 million prescriptions in 2012, CIHI reported. Most were for chronic non-cancer pain relief.
“Opioid prescriptions are still going up, but the encouraging trend we’re seeing is the quantity of doses that are being dispensed is going down,” said Michael Gaucher, director of pharmaceuticals and health workforce information services at CIHI.