Most drug overdoses occur in the home and in the presence of others.
More than half of drug overdoses occur in the presence of someone who could call for help, but most of the time, fear of unknown consequences keeps witnesses from dialing 911.
Even when overdoses occur, some medical practitioners are reluctant to publicly disclose them.
Maybe this is because heroin overdoses occur with a predictable regularity.
Other risk factors for drug overdose include taking drugs alone (two-thirds of overdoses occur when a person is using at home alone) and having experienced a non-fatal overdose in the past.
22 Nonetheless, it appears that the substantial majority of methadone overdoses occur in the general population.
Non-fatal self-poisoning by pharmaceutical drug overdoses was reported in all 14 studies, but in most (11 studies) pharmaceutical overdoses occurred less frequently than pesticide ingestion.
Death certificate data from the Multiple Cause of Death (MCOD) files were analyzed to better understand the drug categories most responsible for the increase in fatal overdoses occurring between 1999 and 2014.
The review also offers insight into the way many of the overdoses occurred.
