| Title | Urine drug testing of chronic pain patients: licit and illicit drug patterns. | | Author(s) | Cone EJ, Caplan YH, Black DL, Robert T, Moser F | | Institution | Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland, USA. edward.cone@comcast.net | | Source | J Anal Toxicol 2008 Oct; 32(8):530-43. | | MeSH | Amphetamines
Analgesics, Opioid
Benzodiazepines
Cannabinoids
Carisoprodol
Chronic Disease
Humans
Methadone
Pain
Pharmaceutical Preparations
Substance Abuse Detection
| | Abstract | Chronic pain patients are frequently maintained on one or more powerful opioid medications in combination with other psychoactive medications. Urine tests provide objective information regarding patient compliance status. Little information is available on testing this unique population. The goal of this study was to characterize drug disposition patterns in urine specimens collected from a large population of pain patients. Confirmation data for 10,922 positive specimens were collated into 11 drug Classes. The number of drug/metabolites tested (#) and number of confirmed positive specimens were as follows: amphetamines (7), 160; barbiturates (5), 308; benzodiazepines (6), 2397; cannabinoids (1), 967; carisoprodol (2), 611; cocaine (1), 310; fentanyl (1), 458; meperidine (2), 58; methadone (2), 1209; opiates (7), 8996; and propoxyphene (2), 385. Subdivision into 19 distinct drug Groups allowed characterization of drug use patterns. Of the 10,922 positive specimens, 15,859 results were reported as positive in various drug Classes, and 27,197 drug/metabolites were measured by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry. The frequency of illicit drug use (cannabis, cocaine, ecstasy) was 10.8%. Being the first study of this type, these data present a large array of information on licit and illicit drug use, drug detection frequencies, drug/metabolite patterns, and multi-drug use combinations in pain patients. | | Language | eng | | Pub Type(s) | Journal Article
| | PubMed ID | 19007501 |
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