scholarly journals Anhedonia in chronic pain and prescription opioid misuse

2019 ◽  
Vol 50 (12) ◽  
pp. 1977-1988 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric L. Garland ◽  
Martin Trøstheim ◽  
Marie Eikemo ◽  
Gernot Ernst ◽  
Siri Leknes

AbstractBackgroundBoth acute and chronic pain can disrupt reward processing. Moreover, prolonged prescription opioid use and depressed mood are common in chronic pain samples. Despite the prevalence of these risk factors for anhedonia, little is known about anhedonia in chronic pain populations.MethodsWe conducted a large-scale, systematic study of anhedonia in chronic pain, focusing on its relationship with opioid use/misuse, pain severity, and depression. Chronic pain patients across four distinct samples (N = 488) completed the Snaith–Hamilton Pleasure Scale (SHAPS), measures of opioid use, pain severity and depression, as well as the Current Opioid Misuse Measure (COMM). We used a meta-analytic approach to determine reference levels of anhedonia in healthy samples spanning a variety of countries and diverse age groups, extracting SHAPS scores from 58 published studies totaling 2664 psychiatrically healthy participants.ResultsCompared to healthy samples, chronic pain patients showed higher levels of anhedonia, with ~25% of patients scoring above the standard anhedonia cut-off. This difference was not primarily driven by depression levels, which explained less than 25% of variance in anhedonia scores. Neither opioid use duration, dose, nor pain severity alone was significantly associated with anhedonia. Yet, there was a clear effect of opioid misuse, with opioid misusers (COMM ⩾13) reporting greater anhedonia than non-misusers. Opioid misuse remained a significant predictor of anhedonia even after controlling for pain severity, depression and opioid dose.ConclusionsStudy results suggest that both chronic pain and opioid misuse contribute to anhedonia, which may, in turn, drive further pain and misuse.

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Garland ◽  
Martin Trøstheim ◽  
Marie Eikemo ◽  
Gernot Ernst ◽  
Siri Leknes

BACKGROUND:Both acute and chronic pain can disrupt reward processing. Moreover, prolonged prescription opioid use and depressed mood are common in chronic pain samples. Despite the prevalence of these risk factors for anhedonia, little is known about anhedonia in chronic pain populations.METHODS:We conducted a large-scale, systematic study of anhedonia in chronic pain, focusing on its relationship with opioid use/misuse, pain severity, and depression. Chronic pain patients across four distinct samples (N = 488) completed the Snaith-Hamilton Pleasure Scale (SHAPS), measures of opioid use, pain severity and depression, as well as the Current Opioid Misuse Measure (COMM). We used a meta-analytic approach to determine reference levels of anhedonia in healthy samples spanning a variety of countries and diverse age groups, extracting SHAPS scores from 58 published studies totaling 2664 psychiatrically healthy participants.RESULTS:Compared to healthy samples, chronic pain patients showed higher levels of anhedonia, with ~25% of patients scoring above the standard anhedonia cut-off. This difference was not primarily driven by depression levels, which explained less than 25% of variance in anhedonia scores. Neither opioid use duration, dose, nor pain severity alone was significantly associated with anhedonia. Yet, there was a clear effect of opioid misuse, with opioid misusers (COMM ⩾13) reporting greater anhedonia than non-misusers. Opioid misuse remained a significant predictor of anhedonia even after controlling for pain severity, depression and opioid dose.CONCLUSIONS:Study results suggest that both chronic pain and opioid misuse contribute to anhedonia, which may, in turn, drive further pain and misuse.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ryan Carpenter ◽  
Sean Patrick Lane ◽  
Stephen Bruehl ◽  
Timothy J Trull

Objective: Prescribed opioids for chronic pain management contribute significantly to the opioid crisis. There is a need to understand the real-world benefits that, despite risks, lead chronic pain patients to persist in opioid use. Negative reinforcement models of addiction posit that individuals use substances to reduce aversive states but have seldom been applied to prescribed opioids. Using ecological momentary assessment, we examined reciprocal associations between opioid use and physical pain, for which opioids are prescribed, and negative affect (NA), for which they are not. Method: Chronic low back pain patients on long-term opioid therapy (n = 34) without significant past-year opioid misuse reported multiple times daily via smartphone over 2 weeks (nobservations = 2,285). We hypothesized that pain and NA would be positively associated with subsequent opioid use, and that use would be negatively associated with subsequent pain and NA. Results: Time-lagged multilevel models indicated that participants were more likely to use opioids and in larger doses following elevated pain and NA. There was also an interaction of concurrent pain and NA on opioid dose. In turn, participants reported reduced pain and NA following larger doses. Additionally, individuals at high risk for opioid misuse, compared with low risk, took larger doses following pain, but also experienced smaller subsequent pain and NA reductions. Conclusions: Opioid use was bidirectionally associated with pain and NA. Findings fit negative reinforcement models associated with risk of developing opioid use disorder. Educating patients and providers about negative reinforcement may help reduce opioid use and opioid-associated risks. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved)


2019 ◽  
pp. 1-18 ◽  
Author(s):  
Caleb J. Reynolds ◽  
Noel Vest ◽  
Sarah L. Tragesser

Although borderline personality disorder (BPD) is associated with both chronic pain and substance abuse, little research examines how BPD features in chronic pain patients may constitute a risk factor for misuse of prescription opioids, and no prior research has examined which particular component(s) of BPD might put chronic pain patients at risk—an oversight that undermines prevention and treatment of such problematic opioid use. In a cross-sectional study of patients in treatment for chronic pain (N = 147), BPD features were associated with several measures of prescription opioid misuse, even controlling for pain severity and interference. Specifically, the identity disturbances and self-harmful impulsivity facets of BPD were most consistently associated with opioid misuse, and exploratory analyses suggested that these factors may be interactive in their effects. Together, these results suggest that BPD features—especially unstable identity and self-harmful impulsivity—play a unique role in problematic prescription opioid use in chronic pain settings.


2011 ◽  
Vol 30 (3) ◽  
pp. 185-194 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph A. Boscarino ◽  
Margaret R. Rukstalis ◽  
Stuart N. Hoffman ◽  
John J. Han ◽  
Porat M. Erlich ◽  
...  

2019 ◽  
Vol 50 (4) ◽  
pp. 644-652 ◽  
Author(s):  
Scott J. Moeller ◽  
Adam W. Hanley ◽  
Eric L. Garland

AbstractBackgroundThe USA is currently enduring an opioid crisis. Identifying cost-effective, easy-to-implement behavioral measures that predict treatment outcomes in opioid misusers is a crucial scientific, therapeutic, and epidemiological goal.MethodsThe current study used a mixed cross-sectional and longitudinal design to test whether a behavioral choice task, previously validated in stimulant users, was associated with increased opioid misuse severity at baseline, and whether it predicted change in opioid misuse severity at follow-up. At baseline, data from 100 prescription opioid-treated chronic pain patients were analyzed; at follow-up, data were analyzed in 34 of these participants who were non-misusers at baseline. During the choice task, participants chose under probabilistic contingencies whether to view opioid-related images in comparison with affectively pleasant, unpleasant, and neutral images. Following previous procedures, we also assessed insight into choice behavior, operationalized as whether (yes/no) participants correctly self-reported the image category they chose most often.ResultsAt baseline, the higher choice for viewing opioid images in direct comparison with pleasant images was associated with opioid misuse and impaired insight into choice behavior; the combination of these produced especially elevated opioid-related choice behavior. In longitudinal analyses of individuals who were initially non-misusers, higher baseline opioid v. pleasant choice behavior predicted more opioid misuse behaviors at follow-up.ConclusionsThese results indicate that greater relative allocation of behavior toward opioid stimuli and away from stimuli depicting natural reinforcement is associated with concurrent opioid misuse and portends vulnerability toward future misuse. The choice task may provide important medical information to guide opioid-prescribing practices.


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