Transition From Acute to Chronic Opioid Use and Chronic Pain

In the current opioid crisis, the use of opioids as the main pain management method is recognized as a consistent risk factor for chronic opioid use and the development of Opioid Use Disorder (OUD), as well as related complications like overdose fatalities among surgical patients. The most recent data suggests that 3.1%-10.5% of surgical patients are at risk of developing OUD. On average, there are over 40 million major surgeries that require post-op pain management, taking place in the United States each year. This puts over 1 million American surgical patients at risk for opioid dependency and misuse. This is a prospective randomized controlled intervention study that will examine the physical and emotional outcomes of surgical patients who receive intraoperative Opioid-Free Anesthesia (OFA) supplemented with Non-Opioid Analgesia (NOAs), and how this relates to surgical patients who receive intraoperative Opioid-Based Anesthesia (OBA).