Re:Letter to an Aspiring Doctor
by classichasclass on Friday November 16, 2018 @01:23PM
(#18470722)
No, we didn't get free opioid samples. I can't imagine many docs got paid, either (I certainly got neither, nor would I have accepted them). What we actually got was a tsunami of alleged literature that said we should be doing more about non-malignant pain and that addiction was a minor risk. And, well, most of us bought it. Of course, look at who turned out to be behind it.
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Re:Letter to an Aspiring Doctor
by tastythrowaway on Friday November 16, 2018 @04:59PM
(#18472317)
respectfully, what remotely well-trained doctor _didn't_ realize that part about an opiate being only a minor addiction risk was obviously bullshit?
The book Dreamland[1] chronicles a lot of this history... but a belief in science means that if scientific studies challenge some of your preexisting beliefs, you accept that evidence.
[1] https://www.amazon.com/Dreamland-True-Americas-Opiate-Epidem...
The doctors were getting shown a whole host of studies which all said that there was only a minor addiction risk. You need to be able to put trust into what the studies are showing.
I'm shocked to the point of disbelief on this as well, this does not pass the smell test for me. Anybody, especially doctors, should have been well aware of the risks, this was not a surprise to anybody with as much as a toe in the public health sector.