Opioid Use in Surgical Management in Musculoskeletal Oncology

Opioid prescribing in the context of orthopaedic surgery has been recognized as having a critical role in the ongoing opioid epidemic. Given the negative consequences of chronic opioid use, great efforts have been made to reduce both preoperative and postoperative opioid prescribing and consumption in orthopaedic surgery. Musculoskeletal oncology patients represent a unique subset of patients, and there is a paucity of data evaluating perioperative opioid consumption and the risk for chronic use. The objective of the present study was to describe opioid consumption patterns and evaluate predictors of chronic opioid use in musculoskeletal oncology patients undergoing limb-salvage surgery and endoprosthetic reconstruction.

The present study was a secondary analysis of the recently completed PARITY (Prophylactic Antibiotic Regimens in Tumor Surgery) trial and included musculoskeletal oncology patients undergoing lower-extremity endoprosthetic reconstruction. The primary outcome was the incidence of opioid consumption over the study period. A multivariate binomial logistic regression model was created to explore predictors of chronic opioid consumption at 1 year postoperatively.

Overall, 193 (33.6%) of 575 patients were consuming opioids preoperatively. Postoperatively, the number of patients consuming opioids was 82 (16.7%) of 492 at 3 months, 37 (8%) of 460 patients at 6 months, and 28 (6.6%) of 425 patients at 1 year. Of patients consuming opioids preoperatively, 12 (10.2%) of 118 had continued to consume opioids at 1 year postoperatively. The adjusted regression model found that only surgery for metastatic bone disease was predictive of chronic opioid use (odds ratio, 4.90; 95% confidence interval, 1.54 to 15.40; p = 0.007). Preoperative opioid consumption, older age, sex, longer surgical times, reoperation rates, and country of origin were not predictive of chronic use.

Despite a high prevalence of preoperative opioid use, an invasive surgical procedure, and a high rate of reoperation, few patients had continued to consume opioids at 1 year postoperatively. The presence of metastases was associated with chronic opioid use. These results are a substantial departure from the existing orthopaedic literature evaluating other patient populations, and they suggest that specific prescribing guidelines are warranted for musculoskeletal oncology patients.

Therapeutic Level IV. See Instructions for Authors for a complete description of levels of evidence.