New examine explores opioid ache remedy theft in long-term care houses

Theft of managed substances like opioid ache remedy (OPM) has been studied in well being care settings resembling hospitals, pharmacies, hospice, and ache clinics. Nevertheless, whereas state officers, pharmacists, and care advocates know that these thefts additionally happen in long-term care houses, the extent and severity are largely unknown as a result of a spot in empirical analysis and lack of nationwide monitoring.

Assistant Analysis Professor Eilon Caspi, a gerontologist and researcher at UConn’s Institute for Collaboration on Well being, Intervention, and Coverage, led a examine to extend consciousness of OPM theft in assisted residing residences and nursing houses. Purdue College College of Nursing doctoral candidate Wei-Lin Xue and nursing Professor Pi-Ju (Marian) Lu collaborated with Caspi.

To the researchers’ information, the exploratory examine is the primary to look at OPM theft in long-term care settings like assisted residing residences and nursing houses. The examine evaluated 107 investigation experiences that the Minnesota Division of Well being categorized as “drug diversion” in 104 Minnesota-based long-term care houses between 2013 and 2021.

It discovered {that a} whole of 11,328.5 tablets have been stolen from 368 residents, though the precise variety of stolen tablets is probably going greater as a result of 12% of the investigation experiences the examine examined didn’t element the variety of medicines stolen.

“On one hand, it is shocking, however then again, long-term care houses are sometimes left behind. That was the case many years prior and throughout the lethal COVID-19 pandemic. All too typically, these care houses appear to be the forgotten phase of our healthcare system,” says Caspi.

“My hope is that this exploratory examine will increase public consciousness of this type of elder mistreatment and encourage schooling in these settings and encourage different researchers to review it extra rigorously. Older adults residing in long-term care settings have a proper to be free from this largely invisible type of mistreatment. That is their house.”

The paper is printed within the Journal of Utilized Gerontology.

Extra findings of the examine embrace:

• About 94% of stolen medicines have been opioid ache medicines (OPM).
• The typical period of theft was 56 days.
• Most often, a single worker was liable for the theft of managed substances.
• Almost half of the workers stealing the medicines have been nurses.
• Nurses performed a key function in initially suspecting remedy theft in at the very least 43% of incidents.
• Within the overwhelming majority of investigation experiences, workers stole medicines for private use resembling ache administration for themselves or buddies or household.

Medicine theft can have far-reaching penalties. Sufferers might reside with excruciating ache due to their remedy being stolen or tampered with. Employees who’re chemically impaired might negatively affect the quality-of-care residents obtain. Employees might additionally lose licensure or be sued for malpractice.

The researchers hope the examine will encourage the Facilities for Medicare & Medicaid Providers (CMS) to begin monitoring this phenomenon in roughly 15,000 nursing houses and that the Nationwide Ombudsman Reporting System (NORS) will start monitoring it in its centralized mistreatment complaints dataset for nursing houses and assisted residing residences.

With uniform nationwide monitoring, researchers, policymakers, and the long-term care trade can higher perceive the frequency and severity of ache remedy theft in addition to the chance elements. They might then develop prevention methods and shield residents’ proper to entry their prescribed medicines.

“If you happen to do not observe remedy theft, primarily, it would not exist and also you’re in no place to deal with it,” stated Caspi.

Caspi notes that monitoring is only one side of addressing OPM theft. The prevalence of remedy theft is influenced by a number of elements together with insufficient remedy administration insurance policies, procedures, and practices, workers not securing medicines or overlooking crimson flags, and different areas of vulnerability awaiting exploitation. A stronger tradition of security in long-term care houses, more durable regulatory requirements and enforcement, and early detection might all assist deter OPM theft.

“Medicine theft would not happen in a vacuum. If care settings do not handle their medicines nicely, then there are extra alternatives for theft. If workers have an dependancy to opioid ache medicines, they’ll typically work out methods to exploit these weaknesses,” stated Caspi.

One other issue is balancing the necessity to maintain workers accountable and to supply assist and therapy to these affected by dependancy whereas utilizing a dignified, stigma-free, however efficient method.

OPM theft is a criminal offense and long-term care houses have a authorized, regulatory, and moral obligation to guard residents. On the identical time, OPM theft is usually a symptom of dependancy, and easily firing an worker discovered to be stealing ache medicines doesn’t assist the worker or shield the general public, says Caspi.