Maggie's Farm

We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.

Our Recent Essays Behind the Front Page

Much Sorry with Delays
Birth, Death and All That Stuff in Between
How to Honor Labor Day, Every Day
My Yom Kippur Miracle (Repost from 2010)
Good intro to fly casting
Peach update, with pie
NYC update
Easy for you to say: To the elites on mass immigration
For NYC on 9/11, Sailors' Snug Harbor
Pickled Peaches
Water Shoes
Labor Costs in U.S.
Your "identity"
Good news about The Great Courses
Uses of Hot Pepper Jelly/Sauce, Chutneys, and Jams
A Saturday Drive to Litchfield County, CT
How to Pick a Kayak
Civilized: Fruit forks and knives
Loads of kayaking on Cape Cod
Psychology Experiments' Questionable Results

Categories


All categories

Quicksearch

Links

Blog Administration

Open login screen

RSS Readers

Add to Google

Subscribe with Bloglines

Wednesday, April 28. 2021

Medical use of opiates

There are mayny sources of pain for which opiates are the best temporary fix. For example, knee replacement.


The number of such patients who become addicted is tiny. What bothers me is the withholding of opiates for cancer patients, especially terminal patients with pain.  Since cancer is the end of the road for roughly half of people (and increasing as other causes of final ends are being better treated), withholding pain control for the terminal out of fear of addiction seems deeply wrong to me.


 Should Dying Cancer Patients Suffer From Undertreated Pain Because of 'Concerns Regarding Addiction'?

Posted by Dr. Joy Bliss in Psychology, and Dr. Bliss at 18:27 | Comments (7) | Trackbacks (0)

Trackbacks
Trackback specific URI for this entry

No Trackbacks

Comments
Display comments as (Linear | Threaded)

Our society sometimes seems crazy in its lack of capacity for regulating complex issues with nuance. Obviously we have a huge modern problem in this country with opiate addiction, but we over simplify handling of the problem. I'm certainly no expert, but it seems to me the vast majority of people with chronic pain seem capable of managing their medicines. I know of one church member who suffers from chronic debilitating pain, and his doctors have been weening him off of his meds solely because of the newly-concocted regulatory obstacles that are in place to prevent abuse. One way of preventing abuse is to stop all instances of the drug being used for any reason whatsoever, is apparently the approach.

I watched my M.I.L. die slowly from COPD. Near the end, the morphine drip alleviated her suffering and mitigated her fears (she was very afraid of dying), and allowed her to still interact with family, kids and grandkids. Removing this treatment option from a terminal patient, because of misplaced societal concerns, would have been (and is) cruel and unusual punishment for a dying person.
#1 Aggie on 2021-04-28 19:21 (Reply)
My mother took a long time to die, actually set the hospice's record for living under their care. During this excruciating time they told us they couldn't give her more pain meds so she wouldn't become addicted. I hope things have changed since the 1990's as she suffered way too long.
#2 JC on 2021-04-28 20:57 (Reply)
Dying, and they're worried about addiction. My God! Idiots, completely lacking in critical thinking skills.
#2.1 Humdeedee on 2021-04-29 07:21 (Reply)
when my dad was dying from pancreatic cancer the head doctor at the cancer department in the hospital said he did not want to give my father a larger dose of morphine as he might get addicted. my brother and I are big guys and we had the strongest urge to push him out the window. he never did figure out why we looked at him that way. another doctor gave my father enough drug to ease his pain. some doctors are completely clueless.
#3 denis miller on 2021-04-28 21:00 (Reply)
My father was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer. In addition, the tumor had wrapped itself around his spine, which probably caused some pain. When the physicians sent him home after the initial diagnosis, they gave him only a strong aspirin for a painkiller.

My mother got back to the physicians ASAP. The reason they gave her for not giving a stronger painkiller was- you guessed it- they didn't want my father to get addicted to painkillers. My mother called the physicians on their poor reasoning- my father was terminal. The physicians conceded their error, and for my father's remaining three months of life, he got strong enough medication to remain pain-free. This was in the 1980s.
#4 Gringo on 2021-04-29 07:27 (Reply)
Denying opiates to terminally ill people is pure evil.
#5 itsatax on 2021-04-29 09:12 (Reply)
English hospices use creative coctails of drugs to leave their patients pain free. Twenty or thirty years ago they discovered, compiling the experiences of the rare patient that went into remission, that they had not a single addict. When drugs meet the pain that is analgesic. When drugs exceed pain that is euphoric, and addictive. Not that we care in the terminal stage.
#6 james wilson (Link) on 2021-04-29 16:30 (Reply)

Add Comment
(Your e-mail will not show in your comment)

By commenting on this site you agree to the site rules listed here. Email
addresses will not be displayed and will only be used for email notifications.

Quick reference guide: [i] italics [/i], [b] bold [/b], [u] underline [/u],
[url] (web address) [/url]. More tips here.

Enclosing asterisks marks text as bold (*word*), underscore are made via _word_.
E-Mail addresses will not be displayed and will only be used for E-Mail notifications.

To prevent automated Bots from commentspamming, please enter the string you see in the image below in the appropriate input box. Your comment will only be submitted if the strings match. Please ensure that your browser supports and accepts cookies, or your comment cannot be verified correctly.
CAPTCHA

BBCode format allowed
 
 
A Chris Southern Consulting website.