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They shut down quite a few "pill mills" in this area. The last time I asked my PCP for some Vicodin (I have fibromyalgia) he didn't want to give them to me even though a prescription for 30 pills will last me almost 6 months so I have been taking Advil liquid gels, some days a lot. I also have previous ulcers and worry about the liver damage from taking so many NSAIDS. He had better give me something when I go in next month. I don't care if he gives me 10 pills at a time. I rarely take them, the pain has to be pretty bad like it was yesterday.
I admit I didn't read this entire thread but I have two points. I heard that this opioid epidemic only involves a small percentage of the population. That only 20% of the population is prone to be addicted to opioids and 80% can take a prescription of pain meds with no real problem stopping after the prescription runs out. I am no sure where I heard that statistic but my and my wife's and everyone I know really experience bears that out. So, if true, 80% of American are condemned to live with pain for the sake of a few with addictive personalities.
I thank god I discovered CBD oil to treat pain. It is not as effective as an opioid but it's not an NSAID.
I know people who enjoy smoking marijuana heavily and alcoholics, but I don't know any pothead or alcoholic burglarizing pot dispensaries, liquor stores, etc.
I don't want to go off topic here, but your comment about potheads and alcoholics not committing crime to get their drug of choice...that's because it's cheap and readily available. If you decriminalize drugs and take the black market out of the equation no one would be robbing drug stores to get oxycontin, they would simply buy it. If you look at crime during prohibition you will understand what I am saying.
I don't want to go off topic here, but your comment about potheads and alcoholics not committing crime to get their drug of choice...that's because it's cheap and readily available. If you decriminalize drugs and take the black market out of the equation no one would be robbing drug stores to get oxycontin, they would simply buy it. If you look at crime during prohibition you will understand what I am saying.
But at what point do you draw the line? Do you make it freely available for anyone to purchase as much as they want? Do you make it available with no prescription? At that point, why have any drug regulation at all?
My wife has severe pains of various types, mostly due to about 9 blown disks in her back.. She has been prescribed pain killers now and then, but often does not take them because of the side effects. A while back in the last month or two she had to take her pills in to, either her Dr or the pharmacy, I forget which, and show them that she still has them and was not selling them.
She did not have to give them up, because she occasionally still needs to take one. But they are watching...
I have had severe osteoarthritis for 30 years. I live with chronic pain every day. Initially I was offered opioid pain medications and I took them but the problem was that every time I took one I loved everyone, I was just a happy freak, life was good, everything was wonderful, I loved everyone. I reflected on that and realized that the pills were doing more than killing my pain they were altering my mood. I flushed them all and I have not taken anything stronger than iburprofen since, even post surgically.
You just have to learn to live with chronic pain, once you do it's manageable. Narcotic pain meds are not the answer no doctor will prescribe them forever and when they cut you off you will either suffer withdrawals or end up buying them on the street, it's better not to start down that road. It's one thing to take them for a week if you break your leg or have surgery but anyone with a bad back or arthritis who thinks they can spend their life taking that crap is delusional
That's just the puritan religious ethic. Opioids have no adverse health effects. You can take them for decades with no physical or neurological degeneration. The laws and regulations that restrict that were just written to boost drug cartel profits. The Afghan war was financed by the opium poppy.
I am not arguing, all I said was that it seems that this crackdown on opioid prescriptions seems like it might be regional. My next door neighbor had a partial knee replacement about 6 weeks ago and he had no problem getting pain relievers, in fact he was pretty much taking them like they were candy. I do think that with the mindset of this administration it will probably become nearly impossible to obtain these drugs for chronic pain in the future, but for now it looks like people should be able to obtain their prescriptions and the biggest problem might be physicians thinking the CDC advisory constitutes new law rather than just guidance.
Please don't think that because I offered my opinion that I don't think it's a good idea to treat long term chronic pain with opioids that I condone anyone losing access to their drugs. It's an individual decision and I harbor no ill will toward people who have decided that is how they need to deal with chronic pain, I'm not on a crusade to take anyone's drugs away from them, ok?
Okay. I think what irked people was that your feelings that opioids are the last alternative seemed so...unshakable, is that the word? I think people here understand your position better. No hard feelings.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sollaces
Well. . . . I hear you can order meds from Canada. There's also Mexico. . .
No, you cannot. Canada is basically a duplicate of US. And in any event you'd have to travel up to Canada to have an appointment with the Dr. who likely would just say, "I'm sorry. I don't prescribe narcotics. Did you actually travel all the way up here just for that?"
As for Mexico there isn't a pain pill to be had. Mexico's policy is to not allow pharmacies to import them.
Yes. It really puts those of us who use pain meds responsibly in a position we don't deserve...how do you convey that you need pain meds without appearing to be a "drug seeker". I AM a drug seeker, in fact when I fill my Progesterone I'm a "drug seeker", that describes ALL of a pharmacy's customers. Again, I had a good pain management doc (one of the few docs I had over this period who treated me like a person, even my surgeon was arrogant and kind of rude) and never had a problem getting them prescribed, but the way I was treated by many health professionals only because I was taking Percs (even those who had nothing to do with prescribing meds) was shabby and shameful.
Remember too this was THE most awful thing I ever went through in 54 years, and it lasted 10 months (after the epidurals I had short periods of no pain thank God) and aside from the pain, I was out of work, and even with disability was going about $1500 in the hole each month. I had savings, but with all my co-pays and Uber rides I spent about $14,000 on medical care...aside from that, I was alone through most of this, and very depressed, and very scared nothing would work and I would be disabled and in pain forever. I went from walking several miles on the beach almost every evening to not being able to walk 10 feet. I once laid on the floor and watched infomercials for 4 hours because the remote was out of reach and it wasn't worth the pain moving would result in. Then I go to the people who are supposed to help me, who are making big bucks off of me, and they treat me like that?
Again, I too work in health care, and often with difficult patients. It's in a poor, rural area and we often get people who DO have a history of alcohol and/or drug abuse and/or psychiatric disorders. Often these patients give us a hard time...sometimes they get aggressive. But when I read this person's chart before I go introduce myself, I do not judge and treat them like they are lesser people just based on one thing, I am still always professional and polite and treat them like human beings, because they are. THEY are the customer, they are paying my salary, and they deserve to be treated like individuals.
Get your state to legalize physician assisted suicide. When Oregon passed its assisted suicide law, it was a real shock to the medical profession. They quit holding out on pain meds because they were panic stricken that their patients would just kill themselves.
The whole addiction thing is a red herring anyway. My wife had kidney surgery last summer. Her doc prescribed 100 oxycodone at a time, and she would go through 100 in a week. She was on them for over a month, and had no addiction symptoms at all. The big problem was pain, but she weaned herself off of them as early as possible because she wanted to go back to driving. Having me be her wheel man for a month really cramped her style.
They shut down quite a few "pill mills" in this area. The last time I asked my PCP for some Vicodin (I have fibromyalgia) he didn't want to give them to me even though a prescription for 30 pills will last me almost 6 months so I have been taking Advil liquid gels, some days a lot. I also have previous ulcers and worry about the liver damage from taking so many NSAIDS. He had better give me something when I go in next month. I don't care if he gives me 10 pills at a time. I rarely take them, the pain has to be pretty bad like it was yesterday.
Be careful with all the NSAIDS, it's not just liver damage. We have a patient now who went to the hospital with acute kidney failure from overuse of NSAIDS. Hopefully we'll come to a happy medium and stop lumping everyone together. Your personal history with Vicodin is all your Dr. should be going by.
The FDA has recently adopted very restrictive regulations for pain killers. Your doctor can no longer call a Vicodin prescription in to a pharmacy. They have to have a paper prescription, and refills are no longer allowed. Physicians are now subject to audits of all their pain killer prescriptions, and if some bureaucrat decides they are prescribing too many they can be faced with a criminal investigation.
What this means is that if Granny breaks her hip and needs pain meds, she has to have somebody sling her and her body cast out of bed and go to the doctor to get a new prescription. If you start passing a kidney stone on Saturday afternoon, your urologist can't phone in a prescription for you. All you can do is suffer until you can get an emergency appointment on Monday.
So yeah, the FDA is the problem.
Those rules do not come from the FDA. They come from the DEA.
(By the way, it's unlikely Granny will be in a body cast for her broken hip.)
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