The main cause of death due to opioid overdose is respiratory depression. In other words, the brain of a person under the influence of opioids can simply forget to breathe. In today’s episode, we talk with Dr. Erica Levitt, associate professor in the Departments of Pharmacology and Anesthesiology at University of Michigan Medical School, who is trying to explain this connection, with the hope of maintaining the powerful pain relieving effects of opioids without their potentially deadly effects.

Episode Transcript

Dr. Erica Levitt Profile

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Welcome to Season 3 of The Fundamentals. We're starting this season with a conversation about AI: How could AI potentially revolutionize healthcare delivery? The application of computer algorithms to medical knowledge has a long history, one that has accelerated in recent years to include generative AI platforms like ChatGPT. U-M expert Dr. Cornelius James discusses how AI is touching everything from doctors’ workloads to diagnostics to medical education.

Learn more about A.I. in healthcare

Learn more about The Fundamentals

A transcript of this episode can be found here.

The Fundamentals is a part of the Michigan Medicine Podcast Network, and is produced by the Michigan Medicine Department of Communication. You can subscribe to The Fundamentals on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On today’s The Fundamentals is Dr. Brummett, Professor at the University of Michigan where he serves as the Senior Associate Chair for Research in the Department of Anesthesiology. He has more than 280 publications, including articles in top journals such as JAMA, JAMA Surgery, Anesthesiology, and Annals of Surgery. He is the Co-Director of the Opioid Prescribing Engagement Network or OPEN at the University of Michigan, which aims to apply a preventative approach to the opioid epidemic in the US through appropriate prescribing after surgery, dentistry and emergency medicine. Moreover, he is the Co-Director of the cross-campus Opioid Research Institute, which was launched in the spring of 2023. He leads multiple NIH grants studying these concepts and receives funding from the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, SAMHSA, CDC, and multiple foundations.

You can learn more about Dr. Brummett here, and you can follow Dr. Brummett @drchadb and the department of anesthesiology @UMichAnesthesia on X.

You can learn more about The Fundamentals on our website.

A transcript of this episode can be found here.

Find out more about the research stories mentioned at the top of the show at the links below:

https://www.michiganmedicine.org/health-lab/feeling-hunger-itself-may-slow-aging-flies

https://www.michiganmedicine.org/health-lab/different-pain-types-multiple-sclerosis-can-cause-difficulty-staying-active

Learn more about other exciting research happening at the University of Michigan, by checking out Health Lab, Michigan Medicine's daily online publication featuring news and stories about the future of healthcare.

The Fundamentals is a part of the Michigan Medicine Podcast Network, and is produced by the Michigan Medicine Department of Communication. You can subscribe to The Fundamentals on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.