Opioid overprescription in adolescents and young adults undergoing hip arthroscopy

Few studies have examined factors related to the increased consumption of opioids after hip arthroscopy in adolescents and young adults. This study sought to determine prescription patterns following hip arthroscopy in this population, and to determine clinical or surgical factors associated with increased post-operative opioid use. Daily post-operative opioid intake was obtained from pain-control logbooks of adolescents and young adults who underwent hip arthroscopy between January 2017 and 2020. Study outcomes were defined as the median total number of opioid tablets consumed, total days opioids were consumed, mean daily opioid consumption and the ratio of opioids prescribed post-operatively to consumed. Clinical and surgical factors were analyzed to determine any association with opioid consumption. Fifty-eight (20%) patients returned completed logbooks. Most patients (73%) were prescribed 30 oxycodone tablets. The median number of tablets consumed was 7 (range 0-41) over a median duration of 7 days (range 1-22). The median ratio of tablets consumed to prescribed was 20%. Increasing patient age at surgery was associated with increased total number of tablets consumed (r = 0.28, P = 0.04) and to the ratio of tablets consumed to prescribed (r = 0.30, P = 0.03). Patients who were prescribed more than 30 tablets consumed on average 7.8 more tablets than patients prescribed fewer (P = 0.003). Patients who underwent regional anesthesia consumed tablets for longer compared with those who did not (median, 10 versus 4 days; P = 0.03). After undergoing hip arthroscopy, adolescents and young adult patients are commonly overprescribed opioids, consuming on average only one-fifth of the tablets prescribed.