With a 10-day supply of opioids, 1 in 5 become long-term users

Re:With a 10-day supply of opioids, 1 in 5 become long-term ... by DanBC on Sunday March 19, 2017 @09:50AM (#13907057)

> People like you, that need the pain meds to live. And people that have a "bad back" aka they grab their back and groan and act like it hurts to get a powerful drug and be high (or sell for a nice profit).

This is an almost offensively simplistic depiction of long term pain.

Those people with the bad backs are not all faking it; it's not all in their heads; they have real pain and it's debilitating. They need something to help them live.

And your A / B choices are wrong too. You give people with long term pain access to pain management clinics which include psychological support; explanation that pain treatment will usually not be able to prevent pain; access to physiotheray and exercise (although these don't do much for some types of long term pain) and access to medication - and this will sometimes be opioid meds.

> As a society

Why is the US getting it so wrong though? Why is the US prescribing such vast quantities of opioids?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:With a 10-day supply of opioids, 1 in 5 become long-term ... by brianwawok on Sunday March 19, 2017 @10:30AM (#13907263)

> Those people with the bad backs are not all faking it; it's not all in their heads; they have real pain and it's debilitating. They need something to help them live.

I am not sure if we agree or disagree. There ARE legit people with bad backs that need and should get pain meds. There are also millions of people with a prescription to an Opiod that have no actual pain.

For example, see

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2017/02/kentucky-...

Are you telling me almost 1 in every 2 people in that town have debilitating pain, and NEED Opiods to survive day to day? I cannot believe that is true.

> Why is the US getting it so wrong though? Why is the US prescribing such vast quantities of opioids?

Many reasons.

a) Doctors get paid to do stuff. If you refuse to give medicine, no one will come to you, and you won't get money. So in the doctors financial interest to prescribe.

b) Some people really DO need medicine. Do you risk screwing those that DO need it to spite the rest of the people?

c) Culture. American lifestyle loves pop a pill to fix a problem. If you can equally fix something with physical therapy or a pill, 9/10 people will pop a pill.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:With a 10-day supply of opioids, 1 in 5 become long-term ... by DanBC on Sunday March 19, 2017 @02:05PM (#13908663)

I'm telling you that people with severe pain need treatment for that pain, but also that if the pain is long term that treatment is probably not opioid meds.

People with real pain sometimes should not be given opioids.

Your suggestion (that the problem is fixed if we stop giving opioids to people who aren't in pain) misses the fact that most of the opioid problem is because people in real actual pain have been misprescribed opioids.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:With a 10-day supply of opioids, 1 in 5 become long-term ... by grkvlt on Sunday March 19, 2017 @12:23PM (#13907993)

> offensively simplistic

No, it's exactly right. There are two classes of people seeking pain medication: those who need it, and those who do not need it. Now, we can argue over who exactly needs the medication, but it is not right to suggest the second category does not exist.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:With a 10-day supply of opioids, 1 in 5 become long-term ... by DanBC on Sunday March 19, 2017 @02:02PM (#13908642)

Right, there might be two groups ("people who need meds" and "people who don't need meds"), but the overlap of those with "people in real pain" and "people faking it" is poor. It's that simplistic, and incorrect, mapping that I'm objecting to.

[ Parent | on HN ]