This is a toolkit from SAMHSA that provides guidance on implementing prevention strategies through the Strategic Prevention Framework, which focuses on assessment, capacity, planning, implementation, and evaluation to understand and address substance misuse and related complex behavioral health problems facing states and communities.

This is an issue brief from SAMHSA that provides an overview of national trends related to opioid misuse and overdose, explains opioid risk factors and routes to access for youth, and describes school-based and school-community initiatives that address opioid prevention. The document includes an extensive array of practical tools, educator resources, and state and local opioid prevention examples. 

This is a report from the National Prevention Science Coalition that highlights the importance of prevention strategies in addressing the opioid crisis and outlines a national blueprint to guide public health policies and prevention services to help individuals, their families, and communities. Community-based and school-based prevention interventions are discussed that can increase protective factors, decrease risk factors, and address adverse childhood experiences. 

This is an academic paper that examines the quality of evidence for prevention strategies related to both preventing opioid misuse and opioid use disorder as well as opioid overdoses. Topics such as PDMPs, safe storage and disposal, insurance strategies, naloxone distribution and education, and community coalitions are explored within this paper.

This comprehensive report from the Surgeon General addresses the entire continuum of care for substance use disorder (SUD) including chapters on prevention, early intervention, treatment, and recovery. There are also chapters on the neurobiology of SUD, the healthcare system, and specific suggestions for key stakeholders. The appendices at the end of the report contain many links to helpful resources. 

This special release by the Surgeon General is an extension of the previous comprehensive report on substance use disorders, highlighting extensive opioid-related information in one document. It provides the latest data on prevalence of substance use, opioid misuse, opioid use disorders, opioid overdoses, and related harms. There are additional resources embedded throughout the report. 

This toolkit from the National Safety Council discusses the three types of prescription drug disposal programs (permanent collection sites, take-back events and mail-back programs) and provides guidance on the most appropriate option for a community to implement to reduce nonmedical opioid misuse. 

This report, written by researchers from the Institute for Behavioral Health, Heller School for Social Policy and Management at Brandeis University in collaboration with The Pew Charitable Trusts, describes eight evidence-based practices aimed at increasing prescriber utilization of prescription drug monitoring programs (PDMPs).

This document informs that PDMPs can be utilized as a state-level tool to monitor and decrease opioid prescribing. 

This is a report from the CDC which serves as a guide to help primary care providers, practices, and healthcare systems manage patients who are on long-term opioid therapy. The guidelines are summarized in detail, both protocols and implementation steps are discussed, and a toolkit is presented to help healthcare professionals.

This is a report from the Partnership to End Addiction that gives an overview of what prevention is, why it is a critical component of a comprehensive response to addiction, and the importance of delivering evidence-based prevention strategies earlier and broader. Research and practice recommendations are provided. 

This is a report from the National Interoperability Collaborative (NIC) that provides eleven recommendations targeted at preventing opioid use disorder (OUD) overdose death. Several of these include addressing trauma, cutting down on the supply of prescription and illicit opioids, and treating OUD in the criminal justice system.

Each recommendation is followed by examples already implemented and helpful resources. The overall aim of the report is to encourage communities to move upstream in their response to the opioid crisis. 

This academic paper provides an overview of the evolution of the opioid crisis framed as an epidemic of opioid addiction through overprescribing. Prevention strategies are discussed across three levels: preventing new cases of opioid addiction (primary prevention), identifying early cases of opioid addiction (secondary prevention), and ensuring access to effective addiction treatment (tertiary prevention).