scholarly journals LO90: Epidemiologic trends in substance and opioid misuse in Alberta: a cross-sectional, time-series analysis

CJEM ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (S1) ◽  
pp. S39-S39
Author(s):  
J. Moe ◽  
C. Camargo ◽  
S. E. Jelinski ◽  
S. Erdelyi ◽  
J. Brubacher ◽  
...  

Introduction: Substance and opioid misuse are growing public health concerns in Canada. Substance use disorders affect 21.6% of Canadians and accounted for $267 million in healthcare costs in 2011. Opioid misuse is a current public health crisis. The extent of the rise in substance and opioid misuse-related Emergency Department (ED) visits in Canada and the demographic groups in which the rise is concentrated have not been elaborated. Alberta has one of the most complete provincial ED visit records and provides an important understanding of national trends. The objective of this study was to evaluate trends in substance and opioid misuse-related ED visits in Alberta from 2010/11 to 2014/5 within demographic cross-sections of the population using administrative ED visit data from the National Ambulatory Care Reporting System (NACRS). Methods: All visits made by adult patients (18 years old) to any of more than 100 Albertan EDs for a substance misuse-related presentation between 2010/11 and 2014/15 were analyzed. Visits were classified as being related to substance or opioid misuse if the primary and/or secondary visit diagnoses were among an a priori determined group of ICD-10 codes. Annual substance misuse-related visits were compared as visits per 100,000 adult population in Alberta to standardize for population growth. Linear regression was used to assess whether ED visits increased significantly over time. A cross-sectional time-series analysis was employed to examine trends within subgroups defined by sex and age categories (18-29, 30-39, 40-49, 50-59, and 60 years) over a 60-month period. Results: 149,719 substance misuse-related visits were made by 65,089 patients and 8768 opioid misuse-related visits were made by 5763 patients. From 2010/11 to 2014/15, substance misuse-related ED visits in Alberta increased by 38% from 811 to 1119 visits per 100,000 population. Opioid misuse-related ED visits increased significantly (64%) from 44 to 72 per 100,000 population. Conversely, total ED visits per 100,000 population did not increase significantly. Substance and opioid misuse-related visits rose more in non-rural than rural areas. Cross-sectional time-series analysis showed that the greatest increase in substance and opioid misuse-related ED visits occurred in males and in the 18-29 year age category, in which visit increases for opioid misuse appeared exponential. Conclusion: Substance and opioid misuse-related ED visits increased significantly from 2010/11 to 2014/15 in Alberta, with the most dramatic increases occurring in young patients and males. These findings have important implications for targeting urgent preventative public health interventions to stem the rise of this epidemic.

2018 ◽  
Vol 109 (2) ◽  
pp. 164-173 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica Moe ◽  
Carlos A. Camargo ◽  
Susan Jelinski ◽  
Shannon Erdelyi ◽  
Jeff Brubacher ◽  
...  

Author(s):  
Cristiano Ialongo ◽  
Antonella Farina ◽  
Raffaella Labriola ◽  
Antonio Angeloni ◽  
Emanuela Anastasi

We read with great interest the paper by Gaudio and colleagues on vitamin D and on the state of patients with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) at the time of admission [...]


BMJ Open ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (6) ◽  
pp. e036182
Author(s):  
Megan Doheny ◽  
Janne Agerholm ◽  
Nicola Orsini ◽  
Pär Schön ◽  
Bo Burström

ObjectiveTo investigate the association between the implementation of an integrated care (IC) system in Norrtälje municipality and changes in trends of the rate of emergency department (ED) visits.DesignInterrupted time series analysis from 2000 to 2015.SettingStockholm County.ParticipantsAll inhabitants 65+ years in Stockholm County on 31 December of each study year.InterventionIC was established by combining the funding, administration and delivery of health and social care for older persons in Norrtälje municipality, within Stockholm County.OutcomeRates of hospital-based ED visits.ResultsIC was associated with a decrease in the rate of ED visits (incidence rate ratio: 0.997, 95% CI 0.995 to 0.998) among inhabitants 65+ years in Norrtälje. However, the rate of ED visits remained higher in Norrtälje than the rest of Stockholm in the preintervention and postintervention periods. Stratified analyses showed that IC was associated with a decline in the trend of the rate of ED visits among those 65–79 years, the lowest income group and born outside of Sweden. However, there was no significant decrease in the trend among those 80+ years.ConclusionThe implementation of IC was associated with a modest change in the trend of ED visits in Norrtälje, though the rate of ED visits remained higher than in the rest of Stockholm. Changes in the composition of the population and contextual changes may have impacted our findings. Further research, using other outcome measures is needed to assess the impact of IC on healthcare utilisation.


2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Alberto Borraccino ◽  
Sara Campagna ◽  
Gianfranco Politano ◽  
Marco Dalmasso ◽  
Valerio Dimonte ◽  
...  

1986 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 331-349 ◽  
Author(s):  
John J. Beggs

This article proposes the use of spectral methods to pool cross-sectional replications (N) of time series data (T) for time series analysis. Spectral representations readily suggest a weighting scheme to pool the data. The asymptotically desirable properties of the resulting estimators seem to translate satisfactorily into samples as small as T = 25 with N = 5. Simulation results, Monte Carlo results, and an empirical example help confirm this finding. The article concludes that there are many empirical situations where spectral methods canbe used where they were previously eschewed.


Viruses ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (7) ◽  
pp. 1314
Author(s):  
Ahmad Shakeri ◽  
Natalia Konstantelos ◽  
Cherry Chu ◽  
Tony Antoniou ◽  
Jordan Feld ◽  
...  

The 2019 novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has placed a significant strain on hepatitis programs and interventions (screening, diagnosis, and treatment) at a critical moment in the context of hepatitis C virus (HCV) elimination. We sought to quantify changes in Direct Acting Antiviral (DAA) utilization among different countries during the pandemic. We conducted a cross-sectional time series analysis between 1 September 2018 and 31 August 2020, using the IQVIA MIDAS database, which contains DAA purchase data for 54 countries. We examined the percent change in DAA units dispensed (e.g., pills and capsules) from March to August 2019 to the same period of time in 2020 across the 54 countries. Interrupted time-series analysis was used to examine the impact of COVID-19 on monthly rates of DAA utilization across each of the major developed economies (G7 nations). Overall, 46 of 54 (85%) jurisdictions experienced a decline in DAA utilization during the pandemic, with an average of −43% (range: −1% in Finland to −93% in Brazil). All high HCV prevalence (HCV prevalence > 2%) countries in the database experienced a decline in utilization, average −49% (range: −17% in Kazakhstan to −90% in Egypt). Across the G7 nations, we also observed a decreased trend in DAA utilization during the early months of the pandemic, with significant declines (p < 0.01) for Canada, Germany, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America. The global response to COVID-19 led to a large decrease in DAA utilization globally. Deliberate efforts to counteract the impact of COVID-19 on treatment delivery are needed to support the goal of HCV elimination.


F1000Research ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
pp. 1327
Author(s):  
Ivan D. Velez ◽  
Eduardo Santacruz ◽  
Simon C. Kutcher ◽  
Sandra L. Duque ◽  
Alexander Uribe ◽  
...  

Background: Dengue, chikungunya and Zika are viral infections transmitted by Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, and present major public health challenges in tropical regions. Traditional vector control methods have been ineffective at halting disease transmission. The World Mosquito Program has developed a novel approach to arbovirus control using Ae. aegypti stably transfected with the Wolbachia bacterium, which have significantly reduced ability to transmit dengue, Zika and chikungunya in laboratory experiments. Field releases in eight countries have demonstrated Wolbachia establishment in local Ae. aegypti populations. Methods: We describe a pragmatic approach to measuring the epidemiological impact of city-wide Wolbachia deployments in Bello and Medellín, Colombia. First, an interrupted time-series analysis will compare the incidence of dengue, chikungunya and Zika case notifications before and after Wolbachia releases, across the two municipalities. Second, a prospective case-control study using a test-negative design will be conducted in one quadrant of Medellín. Three of the six contiguous release zones in the case-control area were allocated to receive the first Wolbachia deployments in the city and three to be treated last, approximating a parallel two-arm trial for the >12-month period during which Wolbachia exposure remains discordant. Allocation, although non-random, aimed to maximise balance between arms in historical dengue incidence and demographics. Arboviral disease cases and arbovirus-negative controls will be enrolled concurrently from febrile patients presenting to primary care, with case/control status classified retrospectively following laboratory diagnostic testing. Intervention effect is estimated from an aggregate odds ratio comparing Wolbachia-exposure odds among test-positive cases versus test-negative controls. Discussion: The study findings will add to an accumulating body of evidence from global field sites on the efficacy of the Wolbachia method in reducing arboviral disease incidence, and can inform decisions on wider public health implementation of this intervention in the Americas and beyond. Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov: NCT03631719. Registered on 15 August 2018.


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