Improving chronic pain management: reducing harm from opioids

The national Medicines Safety Improvement Programme aims to help patients get the maximum benefit from their medicines and reduce waste with the overarching aim of reducing medication related harm in health and social care.

The programme (known as MedSIP) is led by NHS England and Improvement’s patient safety team and delivered locally by the West of England Patient Safety Collaborative.

What does MedSIP focus on?

This online event will raise awareness of MedSIP which aims to improve the management of chronic pain by reducing harm from opioids.

The event will build engagement across all three ICS systems in the AHSN region and provide details to support colleagues in all healthcare sectors to adjust opioid prescribing behaviours.

There is no evidence for the efficacy of high dose opioids (>120mg/day morphine equivalent) on long term pain. The Faculty of Pain Medicine has advised that increasing opioid load above this dose is unlikely to yield further benefits but exposes the patient to increased harm. Despite this, Public Health England’s review (2019) shows that in 2017 to 2018, 540,000 adults in England were prescribed opioid pain medicines for 3 years or more.

The effects of COVID-19 are anticipated to have exacerbated the use of opioids for chronic pain management, which is linked to both deprivation and the prevalence of mental health conditions such as anxiety.

What will I learn?

• Why are we still talking about opioid harm?” And what’s being done to address this long-standing and complex problem.
• Experiences of people living with and supporting people with long-term pain and the impact of long-term opioid use/dependency
• An overview of MedSIP, and local delivery of the programme.
• What you can do to identify patients at risk of harm from opioids and resources to support you.
• Ideas to help you meet systemwide incentives to reduce harm from opioids
• Other medicines related projects including Polypharmacy

Current national opioid statistics:

Over 3 million people are on an oral opioid or opioid patch

16, 000 people are on 5 or more analgesics for more than 3 months

1 ¼ million people on an opioid for more than 3 months

67,000 people on more than 120mg(oral morphine equivalent) for more than 12 months

10,6256 people were admitted to hospital with constipation in 1 year (*and not on any form of laxative)

– Together we can help reduce harm from opioids in the West of England region

Who should attend?

• Prescribers (in primary care and secondary care).
• GPs/doctors/consultants
• Pharmacy teams
• Physiotherapy and occupational therapy teams
• Social prescribers
• Allied Health Professionals

Find out more about MedSIP.