Does opioid use in pets create higher risk for abuse in humans?

The increase in opioid prescriptions for people over the past decade may have been paralleled by an increase in opioid prescriptions for pets, according to a study from researchers at the University of Pennsylvania's Perelman School of Medicine and the School of Veterinary Medicine. The findings, in this first-ever study of veterinary opioid prescriptions, suggest that there is also an increased demand for veterinary opioids, driven by complex procedures performed in veterinary medicine, as well as a heightened awareness of the importance of pain management. Given that opioid prescribing in veterinary medicine is not as heavily regulated as medical prescriptions for humans, it is possible that misused veterinary prescriptions could contribute to the ongoing opioid epidemic. The results are published today in JAMA Network Open. In the study, researchers reviewed all opioid pills and patches dispensed or prescribed for dogs, cats, and other small animals at the University of Pennsylvania's School of Veterinary Medicine (Penn Vet) from January 2007 through December 2017. The results show that the quantity of these prescriptions, as measured in morphine milligram equivalents (MME), rose by 41 percent during the period annually, while the annual number of visits rose by only about 13 percent. As a veterinary tertiary care facility, Penn Vet's unique caseload requires particular attention to and treatment of pain in veterinary species, which may account for increased opioid utilization in the study.