In our recently published article, we have further explored whether this risk is influenced by being an immigrant. Of the over 250,000 individuals who developed prolonged opioid use during the period 2011-2019 in Norway, we observed that there was a lower risk of developing prolonged opioid use among younger immigrants, a higher risk among the middle-aged, and an equal risk for the older individuals when compared to those born in Norway. The greatest difference was found among younger individuals born in Africa, who had almost half the risk compared with those born in Norway. Thanks to the robust study design used, we can assume that the reduced risk of developing prolonged opioid use is not due to differences in the prevalence of various types of pain or of low socioeconomic status, but rather may be a result of cultural differences in the use of pain relievers.
Article contacts:
PhD Ingvild Odsbu e-mail: Ingvild.Odsbu@fhi.no, telefon: 41454379
Håkon Høydal Nestvold e-mail: h.h.nestvold@medisin.uio.no, telefon: 98020945
Nestvold HH, Skurtveit S, Hamina A, Hjellvik V, Odsbu I. The risk of long-term opioid use among immigrants: a national registry-linkage study. Scand J Public Health. 2024 Aug 22:14034948241266744. doi: 10.1177/14034948241266744. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 39169861.