Opioid‐limiting legislation and prescribing habits of otolaryngologists among Medicare beneficiaries

OBJECTIVES: To identify changes in otolaryngologists' opioid prescribing trends for Medicare beneficiaries associated with the enactment of state laws that limit the duration of prescriptions to 3–7 days in the years 2016 and 2017 in the United States. METHODS: Through the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) database, we retrieved data on Medicare enrollment and on the total days prescribed and total number of beneficiaries for the drugs codeine/acetaminophen, hydrocodone/acetaminophen, oxycodone HCl, oxycodone/acetaminophen, and tramadol HCl, by each otolaryngologist prescriber in 13 states from January 2013 to December 2019. We modeled trends using linear spline regression models that controlled for Medicare beneficiaries' state‐level socio‐demographic characteristics' fixed effects. RESULTS: Across the 13 states, the number of days of all five opioids prescribed per beneficiary declined by 8.35 (SD = 12.61). The most commonly prescribed opioid type by otolaryngologists during the 5‐year study period was tramadol HCl (28.72 days/beneficiary) followed by oxycodone HCl (19.99 days/beneficiary). All opioids had declines in prescription days over this time window and higher rates of decline in the years following law passage. Four states experienced statistically significant declines in the prescriptions of all opioids after the year of legislation passage (p < .05). Some states that had the greatest inclines in opioid prescriptions in the years prior to law enactment also experienced the greatest reductions in the time after legislation enactment. CONCLUSIONS: Opioid prescribing practices of otolaryngologists may have been affected by opioid prescription duration limiting laws passed in 13 states in 2016 and 2017. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: Level 4.