Category: Meds

We must disrupt harm

In the mid-1980s, with the AIDS epidemic on the horizon, austere conservative Margaret Thatcher sanctioned the first needle exchanges in the U.K. to prevent the budgetary burden that HIV might otherwise have become on the National Health Service. Nearl…

We must disrupt harm

In the mid-1980s, with the AIDS epidemic on the horizon, austere conservative Margaret Thatcher sanctioned the first needle exchanges in the U.K. to prevent the budgetary burden that HIV might otherwise have become on the National Health Service. Nearl…

Cancer of the future: diagnosis, treatment, and impact on the health care system and patients 

While cancer has been around for decades, the fight for survival and treatment options are still very top of mind. Treatment is simply playing catch up. We continue to try and get rid of the disease that has already infiltrated one’s body rather than c…

Protect the rights of licensed health care workers to take buprenorphine

Early in my addiction medicine fellowship, I met a patient for the second time while shadowing another physician in their practice. The patient was a former nurse with opioid use disorder on maintenance therapy with buprenorphine (commonly called Subox…

Novavax may be able to provide equitable access to another vaccine alternative

On June 7th, 2022, the Novavax COVID-19 vaccine was approved for use in adults by the Vaccine Advisory Committee of the United States Food and Drug Administration. The vaccine has already been authorized in many other nations, including Indonesia, the …

The promise of in silico drug development to improve patient outcomes

In the last two years, pharmaceutical companies have become increasingly interested in the possibilities in silico technologies bring to the world’s multi-billion-dollar drug development market. Among the factors that have been reported as driver…

Allow patients to continue their opioid of choice while starting microdoses of buprenorphine

Twenty-six hours into the shakes, sweats, crawling anxiety, and gripping nausea of opioid withdrawal, Faye caves in and takes a couple of fentanyl tabs. She knows that she must tough out a couple of days without fentanyl to start Suboxone (buprenorphin…

Automatic refill and 90-day fill programs don’t improve medication adherence

Health care has fooled us into believing a number of myths that—taken at face value—sound logical and true. Here’s one of the most pervasive and dangerous myths: Pharmacy’s value comes from convenience and access. And here’s another one: 90-day fills, …

Are psychedelics the heroes or villains?

Like many fellow Americans, I had my first psychedelic experience in the middle of the pandemic, in a place where the use of psychedelics is decriminalized. I grew up in a Communist country, and the ban and stigma against psychedelics were tremendous. …

Before taking Paxlovid, consider these drug interactions

FDA and Health Canada recently approved Paxlovid as an oral treatment option for mild-to-moderate COVID-19 who are at high risk of progression to severe COVID-19. It is a combination drug containing nirmatrelvir/ritonavir. Nirmatrelvir works by binding…