EVIDENCE LIBRARY
Prescription Overlap Surveillance: Benzodiazepine Dispensing Is an Exposure Proxy
An eleven-state surveillance report shows how prescription data can track opioid-benzodiazepine overlap while leaving actual ingestion uncertain.
An eleven-state surveillance report shows how prescription data can track opioid-benzodiazepine overlap while leaving actual ingestion uncertain.
What the surveillance system counted
The Prescription Behavior Surveillance System analyzed selected state monitoring-program records from 2010 through 2016. Measures included opioid prescribing, dosage, overlapping opioid prescriptions, overlapping opioid-benzodiazepine prescriptions, and multiple-provider episodes. These measures describe dispensing patterns over time rather than laboratory-confirmed exposure.
Overlap needs a careful definition
A calculated period of prescription overlap indicates that supplies may have been available concurrently. It does not prove simultaneous ingestion, impairment, misuse, or a drug interaction in a particular patient. Data availability differed across states and measures, and policy differences complicated comparison of trends. The historical findings should not be relabeled as current rates. In a case analysis, dispensing dates and days supplied are useful timeline evidence, but administration records, patient history, toxicology, and clinical observations address different questions. Keeping those evidence types distinct prevents an availability measure from becoming an unsupported causation claim.
Source paper
Original analysis of the supplied journal article, identified as PMC7011442.