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Patients who receive overlapping prescriptions for opioids and benzodiazepines are at excess risk for overdose and death. To determine the frequency of opioid–benzodiazepine prescriptions that overlapped by at least 30 days, researchers performed a cross-sectional study of pharmacy databases from 2013. They evaluated >350,000 Veterans Affairs (VA) patients who also were enrolled in Medicare part D. Patients were classified as receiving prescriptions from the VA only, Medicare only, or from both the VA and Medicare (dual-system).
The proportion of patients who received overlapping prescriptions were significantly higher in dual-system patients than in VA-only and Medicare-only patients (23% vs. 17% and 17%). The effect was more pronounced in …