Introduction: This study is a scoping review of the original research literature onthe misuse of opioids in the rural United States (US) and maps theliterature of interest to address the question: What does theoriginal research evidence reveal about the misuse of opioids inrural US communities?
Methods: This study used a modified preferred reporting items for systematicreviews and meta-analyses (PRISMA) approach which is organized byfive distinct elements or steps: beginning with a clearly formulatedquestion, using the question to develop clear inclusion criteria toidentify relevant studies, using an approach to appraise the studiesor a subset of the studies, summarizing the evidence using anexplicit methodology, and interpreting the findings of the review.
Results: The initial search yielded 119 peer reviewed articles and aftercoding, 41 papers met the inclusion criteria. Researcher generatedsurveys constituted the most frequent source of data. Most studieshad a significant quantitative dimension to them. All the studieswere observational or cross-sectional by design.
Conclusions: This analysis found an emerging research literature that hasgenerated evidence supporting the claim that rural US residents andcommunities suffer a disproportionate burden from the misuseof opioidscompared to their urban or metropolitan counterparts.
Keywords: Misuse of opioids; Nonmedical use of opioids; Opioid scoping review; Opioids in rural United States.
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