Safe Return and Disposal of Unused Opioids

March 27, 2020 updated by: Adam Adler MD, MS, FAAP, Baylor College of Medicine

Keeping Your Children and Home Safe Through Return and Disposal of Unused Opioids

The opioid epidemic in the United States has become a clear health and safety concern for our children and families. Opioids given to our patients for the treatment of pain that go unused after the immediate post operative period pose a major hazard when left in the home unattended. Opioids can be accidentally ingested by small children or deliberately ingested by pre-teens and adolescents leading to major morbidity and or death. Additionally, studies have shown that many people addicted to opioids/narcotics have become so due to ingestion of medically prescribed drugs. Finally, there has been an increase number of home robberies specifically with the intent to steal prescription drugs. Removal of unused medication from the home is an important public safety concern to protect our patients, families and friends. The Sharps Co (R), offers a product called Takeaway Medication Recovery System. This product allows individuals to put unused opioids in a pre-paid envelope which is returned to the company through the postal system and properly incinerated. This provides safe disposal in accordance with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to protect the water table from contamination by drugs disposed of my other means. This system through the Sharps Co would allow for de-identified tracking of returned drugs.

Study Overview

Status

Withdrawn

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Detailed Description

Participants identified by the PI and participating research staff/coordinators that will receive opioids following discharge will be approached. The participant information sheet will be provided to the parents/legal guardian and explained. The consenting study coordinator will review the potential risks of opioids as described in the information sheet. A brief demonstration of the TakeAway envelope will be provided. The participants will be instructed that there is absolutely no cost to them or their family and that the envelope is pre-paid and that all returned or unreturned contents are strictly confidential. A few brief demographic questions will be asked and are completely optional. The participant will be asked for an email and contacted 15 days and 30 days following the procedure. The email will strictly be a reminder to return all un-used medication using the provided envelope Or an optional response reporting nothing to return. If participants do not have an email or do not wish to be contacted, they may still enroll in the study. The entire peri-operative period will progress in the usual manner.

Each envelope has a serial number that will be recorded during enrollment - the company provides access to ascertain exactly how many pills are returned. This access is strictly provided to the PI. The company will have no patient information and therefore only the PI will be able to track the serial number to the patient. The PI and research staff will record the number of pills prescribed to the patient to allow the research team to calculate the percentage of pills returned.

Study Type

Interventional

Phase

  • Not Applicable

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Ages Eligible for Study

No older than 64 years (Child, Adult)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Genders Eligible for Study

All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • All patients being prescribed opioids at discharge in the Clinical Care Center/Wallace Tower Surgical Center or at the Woodlands Campus who have undergone a surgical procedure.

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Parental Refusal to participate Patients not being prescribed opioids for discharge Patients on chronic opioid therapy/chronic pain patients International patients returning abroad (these takeaway envelopes are only paid through the 50 US states, DC and Puerto Rico)

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Primary Purpose: Prevention
  • Allocation: N/A
  • Interventional Model: Single Group Assignment
  • Masking: None (Open Label)

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Other: Opioids Prescribed
Each participant in the study will be given an envelope for return of unused opioids. The percentage of returned number of opioids will be calculated based on the number prescribed
Other: Opioid Return
Calculate the percentage of prescribed to returned opioids

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
% of prescribed unused opioids returned
Time Frame: six months
Calculate the percentage of opioids that are prescribed that are safely returned by participants and their families
six months

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Sponsor

Baylor College of Medicine

Collaborators

Chandrakantan

Publications and helpful links

The person responsible for entering information about the study voluntarily provides these publications. These may be about anything related to the study.

General Publications

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start (Anticipated)

December 1, 2017

Primary Completion (Anticipated)

June 30, 2018

Study Completion (Anticipated)

July 30, 2018

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

November 21, 2017

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

November 22, 2017

First Posted (Actual)

November 24, 2017

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Actual)

March 31, 2020

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

March 27, 2020

Last Verified

March 1, 2020

More Information

Terms related to this study

Additional Relevant MeSH Terms

Other Study ID Numbers

  • H42451

Drug and device information, study documents

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product

No

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product

No

product manufactured in and exported from the U.S.

No

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

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