The Opioid Crisis: A Contextual Framework and Call for Systems Science Research

Abstract

Context: The prevalence of opioid use and misuse has provoked a staggering number of deaths over the past two and a half decades. Much attention has focused on individual risks according to various characteristics and experiences. However, broader social and contextual domains are also essential contributors to the opioid crisis, as interpersonal relationships and the conditions of the community and society people live in. Despite efforts to tackle the issue, the rates of opioid misuse, non-fatal overdose, and overdose death remain high. Many call for a broad public health approach, but articulation of what such a strategy could entail has not been fully realized. Broader systems policies, especially those that emphasize prevention, could more effectively intervene in this crisis.

Methods: In order to improve the awareness surrounding opioid misuse, we developed a social-ecological framework that helps conceptualize the multivariable risk factors of opioid misuse and facilitates reviewing them in individual, interpersonal, communal, and societal levels.

Findings: Our framework illustrates the multi-layer complexity of the opioid crisis that more completely captures the crisis as a multidimensional issue requiring a broader and integrated approach to prevention and treatment.

Conclusions: Future research can elucidate the interconnections among the risk factors as well as leverage systems science tools (e.g., simulation modeling) to uncover the complexities of the crisis, and help evaluate, analyze, and forecast the effectiveness of ongoing and new policy interventions. We explain and call for the need for more systems science approaches in opioid research.

Keywords: opioids, opioid use disorder, systems science