- Opioid use during pregnancy can cause side effects in the infant as well as cause the baby to go through withdrawal after being born.
- Providers of pregnant women with opioid use disorder may prescribe medications such as methadone or buprenorphine as treatment.
- Researchers in Finland recently conducted a review of previously published studies to see how a combination of buprenorphine plus another drug called naloxone compares to other standard treatments for pregnant women with opioid use disorder.
The number of people with opioid use disorder is continually increasing and sometimes people may get pregnant while having the disorder, which can cause many health issues for both the woman and the baby.
To help reduce illicit opioid use in pregnant women and reduce the risk to the fetus, researchers at The Children’s Hospital in Helsinki, Finland, took a look at using a combination of medications in pregnant women with the disorder.
The researchers published their
According to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), opioids are “a class of drugs that include the illegal drug heroin, synthetic opioids such as fentanyl, and pain relievers available legally by prescription, such as oxycodone, hydrocodone, codeine, morphine, and many others.”
Providers prescribe opioids to treat and manage pain conditions, such as a broken bone or a chronic illness.
Sometimes people abuse or misuse prescription opioids or use illegal ones, which can lead to a person developing opioid use disorder. The NIH noted that around 2.5 million people in the United States have this disorder.
Opioid use disorder is prevalent enough in the United States that the
People who have opioid use disorder may experience changes in their brains and…
Read the full article here