- "Doctors should limit prescriptions — giving only a three-day supply for acute pain, for example — and look for alternative treatments".
- "For chronic pain, narcotics should be the last resort."
Unbelievable. That is so far removed from what they are telling us at the beginning of the decade that it is actually laughable. In fact, doctors were liable if patient's pain was not adequately treated to their liking. Check out this article from 2001 in the American Medical News:
Doctor guilty of elder abuse for undertreating pain: A California court ruling could spur physicians to become more knowledgeable about the best way to treat their patients' pain.
Want more? Here is what I found from the year 2000:
Jim Guest, Executive Director of the American Pain Foundation, claims “Over 50 million Americans live with chronic pain. The crime is that treatments and therapies to manage most pain are available, yet most pain goes untreated, under treated, or improperly treated.”
This is just another example of "no good deed goes unpunished". Remember this debacle as we see each new fad or proclamation come down from the ivory towers, the supposed experts or our dear government.
Posts
3 comments:
I totally understand under treated pain. Having arthritis from Lyme disease, neuropathic pain, and muscle spasms.........it wasn't until I saw an MD for a knee injury and was given a pain medication that I found something that would also treat my other pain and had to beg the doctor to keep taking it prn. It was either that or go back to taking 800 mg ibuprofen mixed with acetaminophen several times a day with little to no relief. Fortunately this MD has let me have this med which I use sparingly for fear I won't get a refill and only take it when I have to pull my 12 hr. shift for several days in a row. You know, I do need to work to support myself and working in pain is not good. When I am not working I am suffering in pain. Nice huh!
If one is any other physician but primary care, this 'pain thing' isn't a problem...the non-PCP simply says, "Oh, I don't prescribe meds for pain. You need to see your primary doctor for that." I've had patients tell me they heard this from their orthopedic surgeon (post-op, by the way), their dentist, their OB-GYN (again, post-op) and, believe it or not, from a pain clinic doc! No one wants to deal with the narcs at all - no narcs means less B.S. phone calls and less exposure to the microscope of the DEA.
Primary Care - Where $h|+ doesn't roll downhill, it's piles up to your armpits...
DG, etc. you are right on target. One of the man reasons I left pri-care for full-time ER was this issue. Like every primary doc nationwide, I always had the folks with arthritis, post-polio, RLS...you name it. And yes, also the sorry-ass addicts, and yes, some that were in BOTH categories, and yes, some with no physical discomfort apart from their chronic "life pain" (Doug's brilliant SLS diagnosis). It would have been great to just use my own judgement regarding pain relief, but I too quickly became both paranoid and cynical, and not without cause. So I can be sued for writing too many narcs, or not enough?? "I'm sorry, I'm the ER doc and don't treat chronic pain." I wish it wasn't that way, but ...
Post a Comment