Medicare opioid prescriptions in Colorado top national average
While a slight increase over 2013, it’s difficult to correlate any Medicare prescription data with overdoses.
Opioid prescriptions among Medicare users in Colorado are more frequent than the rest of the nation, according to the latest data compiled by the Colorado Health Insitute.
7.4 percent of Medicare prescriptions in 2014 were for opioids — pain killers such as codeine and oxycodone. Most Medicare recipients are seniors. But people with disabilities or kidney failure can also qualify.
Colorado finds itself 1.7 percent higher than the national average of 5.4 percent of Medicare prescriptions being opioids. Rural counties, especially in the southern part of the state, tend to be higher.
In Saguache County, nearly half of Medicare prescriptions are for opioids.
That puts the county, with just under 7,000 residents, 42 percent above the national average.
But CHI warns that the data can change substantially depending on a number of factors.
“The range of prescribing rates across reported counties in Colorado is substantial. However, rates should be considered carefully. Percentages can be affected by the size of a county’s Medicare population, the number of prescribers and other factors,” the report said.
This is especially true for the county that, on paper, looks to be particularly high in opioid perscriptions.
“Saguache County is one of only two counties in the state with just a single Part D prescriber, and it has the second smallest number of Part D prescriptions overall at 124,” the CHI report said.
“So a relatively small number of opioid prescriptions — 60 — results in an opioid prescribing rate way above the rest of the state.
From 2013 to 2014 there was a reported 7.3 percent decrease in the number of opioid prescriptions, according to CHI.
It’s difficult to correlate the Medicare prescription data to other troubling drug addiction statistics, such as overdose death rates — those include other drugs beyond prescription opioids.
“That said, eight of the 26 counties with above-average opioid prescribing rates — Arapahoe, Bent, Conejos, Las Animas, Rio Grande, Alamosa, Pueblo and Dolores — also have drug overdose death rates above the state average,” CHI points out.
The number of drug overdoses has steadily increased in Saguache County, too. In 2003, there overdose death rate was 0–2 people per 100,000 residents. In 2014, the overdose death rate for Saguache County was 14–16 people per 100,000 residents.
Across the state overdoses are becoming more frequent. In 2014, nearly 900 Coloradoans died from a drug overdose.
Twelve Colorado counties have drug overdose death rates of more than 20 per 100,000 residents. They are among the highest in the nation. Seven of those counties — Baca, Bent, Conejos, Rio Grande, Las Animas, Costilla and Huerfano — are in rural southern Colorado.
The other three — Adams, Denver and Pueblo — are more urban counties along along the Front Rage, while Delta is on the Western Slope and Jackson is farther north.
