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Opioid Epidemic Hits Neonatal ICUs

NPR
Published December 31, 2015 at 10:20 AM PST
Physician performing a physical exam on a newborn baby after a Caesarean section. (Wikimedia Commons)
Physician performing a physical exam on a newborn baby after a Caesarean section. (Wikimedia Commons)

This week we’ve been looking at how the headlines of 2015 have hit home.

The opioid epidemic is certainly one of the top stories of 2015, new numbers from the CDC show that deaths from overdoses reached an all-time high of 47,000 in 2014, the latest figures available. And hospital neonatal intensive care units across the country are seeing a corresponding rise in the number of babies born dependent on opioids.

Here & Now’s Robin Young speaks with Dr. Robert DiGiuseppe, a neonatologist at Coastal Carolina Neonatology at the New Hanover Regional Medical Center in Wilmington, North Carolina.

Guest

  • Dr. Robert DiGiuseppe, a neonatologist at the New Hanover Regional Medical Center in Wilmington, North Carolina.

Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.