Predicting the Mortality Rate Due to Opioid Addiction At the County Level

Daniel Lee

August 17, 2018

Slides created using Jupyter Notebook, RISE, and reveal.js

What is the opioid epidemic?

Annual Cause of Death by Opioid Overdose

Number of Deaths by Demographic Factors 1999 - 2016

Living with an Opioid Addiction

Reading Between the Numbers - Why We Should Care

Many are dying because of opioid overdose. But it's not just death. Many people that are not represented in these death numbers are struggling with opioid addiction. Not only does opioid addiction destroy the health of the addicted individual, but it also negatively impacts the lives of the addicted person's loved ones, his or her families, and, ultimately, the communities at large. Dangers of opioid addiction to communities have been recognized by other nations as well. For example, in the 1950s, because of the destroyed lives and communities by opioid addiction, China not only banned opium, but it also executed those who were caught selling opium.

Addiction to opioids, like any other addictions, leads to financial problems, health problems, lack of self control, relational difficulties, and ultimately destroys every aspect of the person, and the end result is death. Watch the video (https://youtu.be/VpEQaa6jzUU) of the story of Amy and her struggle with opioid addiction to see a glimpse of the struggles that come with opioid addiction.

• Not represented in the death numbers are those who are struggling with opioid addiction

• Addiction to opioids, like any other addictions, leads to

• Health Problems

• Financial Problems

• Relational Problems

Opioids

• Diverse class of moderately strong painkillers

• Oxycodone

• Hydrocodone

• Fentanyl

Problem

• Can we predict how bad the problem will be in a county?

• Useful to help allocate resources

• Learn more about causes of opioid overdose

• Make biggest impact

Problem

• Predict the county's mortality rate caused by drug overdose for 2016 given various independent variables

• County's median household income

• Population estimates

• Unemployment

• Poverty rate estimates

• Educational attainment

• Opioid prescription rate

USA by Opioid Overdose Mortality Rate, 2016

Top Ten Counties with Highest Mortality Rate Caused by Opioid Overdose in 2016

County with Highest Mortality Rate Due to Opioid Addiction

• Highest county: Harrison, KY

• 118 deaths per 100,000 people due to opioid overdose

Description of Data

• US County Opioid Prescribing Rates 2016
  • https://www.cdc.gov/drugoverdose/maps/rxcounty2016.html
• Unemployment, median household income, educational attainment, poverty rate, and population:
  • https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/county-level-data-sets/download-data/
• Underlying Cause of Death
  • https://wonder.cdc.gov/controller/saved/D77/D39F042

Crude Opioid Mortality Rate

• Estimated rate for deaths caused by opioid overdose in the county for 2016 (per 100,000 people)

• Specifically, the types of drug-related deaths include the following:

• Drug poisonings (overdose)

• Unintentional

• Suicide

• Homicide

• Undetermined

Crude Opioid Mortality Rate

• The specific drugs included in the death rates are the following:

• Opium

• Heroin

• Opther opioids

• Methadone

• Other synthetic narcotics

• Other unspecified narcotics

Distribution of County Level Opioid Overdose Mortality Rate

Distribution of County Level Opioid Overdose Mortality Rate

Distribution of County Level Opioid Overdose Mortality Rate

Distribution of County Level Opioid Overdose Mortality Rate

Distribution of County Level Opioid Overdose Mortality Rate

Violin Plots of All Variables Except Crude Mortality Rate

Correlation Heat Map of All the Variables

Pearson's Correlation Between Crude Mortality Rate and All Other Variables

Scatter Plots of Crude Opioid Mortality Rate and Other Variables

Hypothesis Test of Correlation By Permuting Samples - Distribution of Correlation Values

Linear Regression and Confidence Interval Using Pairs Bootstrap

Conclusion From Exploratory Data Analysis

• Counties with higher opioid addiction mortality rates have

• Higher GQ estimates

• Higher population estimates

• Higher median household income

Conclusion From Exploratory Data Analysis

• Further research

• Why do counties that have higher population living in group quarters have higher opioid overdose mortality rates?

• Possibly consider looking into specific group quarters estimates by county