The American Dental Association announces that they want to drastically cut back on prescribing opioid painkillers. The association announced a new policy on Monday, that, “it is essential to eliminate opioids from your arsenal, if at all possible.” That was according to the group’s president, Dr. Joseph Crowley. The Chicago-based group represents about 161,000 dentists. The group is also pushing for limiting opioid prescriptions to no more than a week and having dentists take mandatory education, which encourages using other type of painkillers. Dentists write fewer than 7-percent of the US opioid prescription, but new research shows that practice has increased over the past few years. It is also true that most dental pain uses less risky opioids, but they can still be addictive. In most dental cases, which involve opioids, dentists prescribe Vicodin or Percocet for short-term pain on procedures. That includes removing wisdom teeth and other tooth extractions, root canal work and dental implants. Nonsteroidal anti-inflammation drugs include ibuprofen or Tylenol, which can provide better pain relief in some cases. Dentists are the leading prescribers of opioids for US teens, and the largest increase in dental prescriptions from 2010 to 2015 on 11 to 18-year-olds. That is according to a study published in the Journal of the American Dental Association. That rate climbed from almost 100 to 165 patients per 1,000. Among all ages, the rate increased from 131 to 147 patients per 1,000.