My last Medscape video commentary of 2015 discusses the draft Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guideline for primary care clinicians who prescribe opioids for patients with chronic non-cancer pain. Twice as many people died from overdoses of prescription opioids than from heroin overdoses in 2014, and although some have wanted to blame the problem on a small number of high-volume prescribers operating "pill mills," family physicians - myself included - bear some responsibility for overprescribing these medications and must be part of the solution.
I would like to take this opportunity to thank Laurie Scudder and her team at Medscape Family Medicine for inviting me to tape these monthly physician-oriented pieces, giving me complete freedom to choose the topics, and for adhering to the highest standard of professionalism throughout the process.
Here is a complete list of my commentaries this year:
1. Lung Cancer: To Screen or Not to Screen (1/16/15)
2. Transforming Primary Care One House Call at a Time (3/31/15)
3. Can Patients Understand the Concept of Overdiagnosis? (4/7/15)
4. Screening Mammography Guidelines: The Change Clinicians Should Know (5/29/15)
5. Conflicts of Interest and Guidelines: Is Bias A Worry? (7/27/15)
6. Primary Care Training: Follow the Money (8/7/15)
7. "Death Panels": Moving Beyond the Rhetoric (9/10/15)
8. Breast Cancer Screening: The Evidence Is Piling Up (10/26/15)
9. Putting SPRINT in Focus for Primary Care (11/16/15)
10. Opioid Abuse: A Primary Care-Created Problem? (12/22/15)