Pain Medicine Misuse Essay examples

In my opinion, misuse of pain medication is a fault of medical providers rather than a person who suffers from addiction. According to Goodman (2006), “addiction designates a process whereby a behavior, that can function both to produce pleasure and to provide escape from internal discomfort, is employed in a pattern characterized by recurrent failure to control the behavior (powerlessness) and continuation of the behavior despite significant negative consequences (unmanageability)”. There are many different cases where a doctor prescribes incorrect dose of medication or a patient who lacks the ability to resist the pain and receives medicine that is too strong or not adequate to his or her needs. In 1980’s the leading physicians were trained to recommend “opioid therapy” as a treatment to those who suffered from chronic pain or were terminally ill (Libby, 2005). Later, those medications were also prescribed to people who suffered from nonterminal conditions. That change led to the significant increase in sales of pain medication and brought millions of dollars in profit throughout 1990s (Libby, 2005). This resulted in stronger incentive from pharmaceutical point of view to produce more pills that could be more available to ordinary people. Many of the physicians did not recognize the problem of prescribing more and more painkillers to those who did not truly need them. Forming that habit, patients unconsciously started to being addicted to medications that “improved” their state of mind and relieved from pain. Whenever patient that was in pain took the pill, part of his brain recognized the pleasant feeling and wanted to repeat it every time a person experienced physical discomfort. This is the process of how addiction is formed. As a consequence of realizing the size of a problem, many physicians and pain specialist started to avoid opioid treatment, causing many Americans to suffer from chronic pain even if therapies were available to treat the pain (Libby, 2005). Being previously accustomed to pills, patients had to change their mind set due to the lack of medication availability. Knowing that there is easier way to preserve the pain, people were not willing to put effort in solving the problem, they just wanted to take the pill and be free from agony. Pharmacists are the main link in the chain of drug delivery to the patient (Chernin, 2001). It is very important for both sides, drug provider as well as receiver, to recognize appropriate pain management and abuse. According to Cherin (2001), it was assessed that about 50 million Americans suffer from chronic pain. From my point of view medication providers are responsible to diagnose patients accurately and provide the best possible solution. Doctors’ job is to treat people with the adequate methods, either it is psychological help or use of medications. Chronic pain is one of the main public health problems estimating that “40% to 50% of patients in routine practice setting fail to receive adequate relief“ (Cherin, 2001). Some physicians are afraid to prescribe pain medication in order to avoid addiction, which is why chronic pain occurs. In my opinion, avoiding prescriptions is not a right solution to a problem and once patient gets wrong dose of medicine it can suffer from further ailments. Every addiction starts with a use of medicine. Patients who

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