Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Buprenorphine and Extended-Release Naltrexone Filled Prescriptions During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Importance: COVID-19 disrupted delivery of buprenorphine and naltrexone treatment for opioid use disorder (OUD), and during the pandemic, members of racial and ethnic minority groups experienced increased COVID-19 and opioid overdose risks compared with White individuals. However, whether filled buprenorphine and naltrexone prescriptions varied across racial and ethnic groups during the COVID-19 pandemic remains unknown.

Objective: To investigate whether disruptions in filled buprenorphine and naltrexone prescriptions differed by race and ethnicity and insurance status or payer type.

Did the Hospital Readmissions Reduction Program Reduce Readmissions? An Assessment of Prior Evidence and New Estimates.

In this article, we provide a comprehensive, empirical assessment of the hypothesis that the Hospital Readmissions Reduction Program (HRRP) affected hospital readmissions. In doing so, we provide evidence as to the validity of prior empirical approaches used to evaluate the HRRP and we present results from a previously unused approach to study this research question-a regression-kink design. Results of our analysis document that the empirical approaches used in most prior research assessing the efficacy of the HRRP often lack internal validity.

Assessment of Filled Buprenorphine Prescriptions for Opioid Use Disorder During the Coronavirus Disease 2019 Pandemic.

This cohort study examines changes in the number of buprenorphine prescriptions fill by individuals with opioid use disorder before and during the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic.