Report: Stemming the Opioid Crisis is Possible, But it Will Take a Culture Change

​With drug overdose now the leading cause of death from unintentional injury in the United States, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine on July 13, 2017, issued a report on balancing the risks and benefits of opioid use. The opioid crisis creates an intersection between the goals of reducing the burden of suffering from pain and containing the rising death toll from opioid misuse. Chronic pain and opioid misuse "both represent complex human conditions" that affect millions of Americans, the report said. The report, which was requested by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), asserts that stemming the opioid crisis is possible, but it will take several years of coordinated effort from state and local governments and FDA, as well as a culture change in how providers approach chronic pain.