Managing Acute and Chronic Pain in Patients on Medication Assisted Treatment

Daniel P. Alford, MD, MPH, FACP, FASAM | Associate Professor of Medicine Program Director, Addiction Medicine Fellowship Medical Director, Office-Based Opioid Treatment and MASBIRT TTA programs Boston University School of Medicine

Webinar Description: 
This webinar addresses the challenges of treating acute and chronic pain in patients with opioid use disorders maintained on MAT, including methadone, buprenorphine and naltrexone. The August 26th session features a case discussion.

Patients with a history of opioid use disorders often have increased pain sensitivity.  Opioid agonists taken once per day to treat opioid addiction (methadone, buprenorphine) do not provide analgesia beyond 8 hours and may interfere with co-administered opioid analgesics.

The appropriate treatment of acute pain in patients on methadone and buprenorphine includes continuing the patient’s baseline opioid requirements to avoid increased pain sensitivity associated with opioid withdrawal. These patients are also at risk of cross-tolerance to opioid analgesics and therefore adequate pain control will often necessitate higher opioid doses at shorter dosing intervals. Various treatment options will be discussed for both outpatient and inpatient acute pain management.

For patients on MAT and suffering from chronic pain, nonopioid analgesics and nonpharmacological approaches should be tried. Strategies for managing chronic pain requiring opioids will be discussed.

Accreditation and Designation:
The American Psychiatric Association (APA) is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) to provide continuing medical education for physicians.

The APA designates this enduring material for a maximum of 1 (one) AMA PRA Category 1 Credits™. Physicians should only claim credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.

System Requirements: 
PC-based attendees Required: Windows® 8, 7, Vista, XP or 2003 Server Mac®-based attendees Required: Mac OS® X 10

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