Trial reportDrug and alcohol review2025
What influences Australian pharmacists' decisions to supply opioids? Results from a survey and randomised controlled factorial experiment.
Trial report in Drug and alcohol review, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed.
- What influences Australian pharmacists' decisions to supply opioids? Results from a survey and randomised controlled factorial experiment.Drug and alcohol review · 2025Trial
- Experiences and Predictors of Real-Time Prescription Drug Monitoring Program Use Among Australian Community Pharmacists: A Nationwide Study.Drug and alcohol review · 2026Article
- Community pharmacists' practices and perspectives on deprescribing high-risk psychotropic medicines: National survey findings.British journal of clinical pharmacology · 2026Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
Abstract
introductionPrescription drug monitoring programs (PDMP) identify medication-related risks to support clinical decision-making. This study aims to report prescription medication refusal rates based on PDMP alerts and determine how PDMP alerts and other characteristics influence pharmacists' decisions to supply opioids.
methodsPharmacists completed an online survey and randomised controlled factorial experiment. Generalised linear models explored differences in the proportion of refusals by state. Pharmacists indicated their likelihood to supply opioids based on six clinical vignettes. Mixed-effect linear regression models explored the association between vignette and pharmacy-related characteristics and the likelihood to supply opioids.
resultsData related to 598 pharmacists (n = 3370 vignettes). Jurisdiction was associated with refusals; Western Australian pharmacists had significantly lower odds of refusing supply compared with Victorian pharmacists (odds ratio = 0.186, 95% confidence interval 0.104-0.331). The factorial experiment revealed the strongest predictors of reduced likelihood to supply were the PDMP high dose (β = -2.76, p < 0.001) and multiple prescriber (β = -3.79, p < 0.001) alerts. Unemployment (β = -0.0421, p < 0.001), hepatitis C (β = -0.260, p = 0.009), depression (β = -0.301, p = 0.003), high opioid dose (β = -0.259, p = 0.002) and co-prescribed opioids with benzodiazepines (β = -0.478, p = 0.001) resulted in smaller reductions in the likelihood to supply. Older patient age, patient familiarity and rural/remote pharmacies were associated with significant, albeit small increases in the likelihood to supply with respective 0.293-, 0.250- and 0.339-unit increases. DISCUSSION AND
conclusionsJurisdictional differences in refusal to supply were observed, while PDMP alerts were the strongest predictor of reduced likelihood to supply opioids in the factorial experiment. Unintended consequences of PDMPs including abrupt opioid discontinuation observed elsewhere, should be avoided following the implementation of this supply-side policy in Australia.
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