Overtreatment in the United States.

Background: Overtreatment is a cause of preventable harm and waste in health care. Little is known about clinician perspectives on the problem. In this study, physicians were surveyed on the prevalence, causes, and implications of overtreatment.

Medical Harm: Patient Perceptions and Follow-up Actions.

Objectives: Much research has been conducted to describe medical mistakes resulting in patient harm using databases that capture these events for medical organizations. The objective of this study was to describe patients' perceptions regarding disclosure and their actions after harm.

Methods: We analyzed a patient harm survey database composed of responses from a voluntary online survey administered to patients by ProPublica, an independent nonprofit news organization, during a 1-year period (May 2012 to May 2013).

Extended access oxycodone self-administration and neurotransmitter receptor gene expression in the dorsal striatum of adult C57BL/6 J mice.

Rationale: Although non-medical use of oxycodone continues to be a growing problem in the United States, there are no animal studies examining the effects of long-term oxycodone self-administration (SA).

Objectives: The current study was designed to examine chronic oxycodone SA by mice (14 days), in novel extended (4 h) SA sessions and its effect on selective striatal neurotransmitter receptor mRNA expression.

Methods: Adult male C57/BL6J mice were either allowed to self-administer oxycodone (0.

Self administration of oxycodone by adolescent and adult mice affects striatal neurotransmitter receptor gene expression.

Illicit use of prescription opioid analgesics (e.g., oxycodone) in adolescence is a pressing public health issue.

Chromatin alterations in response to forced swimming underlie increased prodynorphin transcription.

Antagonism of the kappa opioid receptor (KOR) has been reported to have anti-depressant-like properties. The dynorphin/KOR system is a crucial neurochemical substrate underlying the pathologies of addictive diseases, affective disorders and other disease states. However, the molecular underpinnings and neuroanatomical localization of the dysregulation of this system have not yet been fully elucidated.