The Prescription Drug Epidemic

TODAY IS THURSDAY, MAY 23, 2013

May 12, 2011 at 10:00 AM

The Prescription Drug Epidemic

Prescription drug abuse is now worse than the crack epidemic. Oxycontin. Xanax. Pill mills. Doctor shopping. We’ll get the full story.

(ep_jhu/Flickr)

Thursday, On Point: the pipeline and price of a pain killer epidemic.”

Prescription drug abuse is sky-rocketing in the United States as accidental overdose deaths now exceed crack deaths in the 1980s. Overdose from prescription painkillers like Oxycontin and Xanax is now the leading cause of accidental death in 17 states.

In Kentucky, particularly in the Appalachian region, prescription drug overdoses run rampant, according to Laura Ungar, a reporter for The Courier-Journal in Louisville, Ky.

In Kentucky, “prescription drug over doses deaths have skyrocketed in the past decade,” Ungar told On Point. “They rose from about 400 [deaths] in 2000 to 978 [deaths] in 2009. You can see the growing toll that it is taking.”

On Point caller Michelle in Carter County, Ky., grew up with her mother addicted to prescription medications.

“We would wake up in middle night and have to put her to bed because she was like a zombie,” Michelle said. “It was like no one was there.” Michelle is now going to school to be a drug abuse therapist.

Many addicts start taking prescription pain medication for a legitimate injury. (AP)

Deaths due to overdose of prescription medications are outstripping overdoses by traditional drugs like crack-cocaine, heroin or methamphetamine. Ungar says that the prescription drug trade is “akin to the illegal drug trade, where many of our folks in Kentucky are getting drugs that originated in Florida.”

In fact, 98 of the nation’s top 100 prescribers of such drugs are in Florida — the “pill mill” end of a pipeline feeding a mounting epidemic of prescription drug abuse across the United States. Pharmaceutical pain killers are now churned out of “pill mills” and end up in poor counties in West Virginia, Kentucky and Tennessee.

The toll is high as regulation catches up to the addiction epidemic. West Virginia, where Alison Knezevich is a reporter for The Charleston Gazette, has the nation’s highest rate of drug deaths.

“In one small town where I did interviews, the local prosecutor said that he feared an entire generation had been lost to prescription drug abuse,” Knezevich told On Point.

Guests:

Laura Ungar, reporter for The Courier-Journal in Louisville. She co-authored a series in January for the paper titled “Prescription for Tragedy” about the prescription drug problem in Kentucky.

Alison Knezevich, reporter for The Charleston Gazette. This past January she wrote a series for the paper “Pillage: Prescription Drug Abuse in West Virginia.”

Janet Zink, reporter in the Tallahassee bureau for the Saint Petersburg Times and Miami Herald. She has been covering the crackdown on the pill mills in Florida.

Zeno

There is a drug dealer on almost every well traveled corner of my small town, and there is a network of people involved in pushing these drugs and selling them. Sometimes the pushers give out free samples of their latest and more powerful drugs that they get from their suppliers to get the addicts started. Its just good business.

All of these dealers are at a minimum millionaires driving around in their fancy cars and they live in expensive homes, there are clearly long lines of addicts waiting for their drugs, and the police and government do nothing to stop these pushers or their suppliers.

They advertise on TV during the evening news and during pro golf games and sell shares of their “corporations” on Wall St.

On the other hand… there are the individuals in my town who try to do the same thing as these corporations, and they are called criminal parasites ruining society, and are subject to arrest when caught doing so.

Its very much like gambling. Various governments and private entities can run gambling parlors, but its illegal for individuals. Don’t get caught using drugs from these people (even if its the same drug, from the same supplier), because that too is a crime.

Now that’s market control.
- Michael
  
  Reaganomics at it’s finest. Only the strongest and smartest make it, there’s no room for bailouts of a drug dealer.
Yar

Here is a different approach to stopping black market drug diversion.
Free markets won’t regulate drug use or protect society from the fallout of addiction. As a civil society should add chain of custody requirements to all drugs manufactured with potential for abuse. Printing a unique number on each pill that is traceable from production to each patient’s mouth will show where drugs are entering the black market. If pharmaceutical companies won’t prevent off label use of their products then they should lose their patent rights to that drug. Threating to revoke a patent will make companies take their responsibility to prevent off label use seriously. Society grants exclusive rights to make a drug to a company through patents, we can take those rights away if the company doesn’t follow our law.
Kentucky gets most of its black market oxycotton from pain clinics in Florida. The Governor of Florida recently said he did not want to track narcotics due to patient privacy. Purdue Pharma, the manufacturer of oxycotton said they would pay to create the system to track prescriptions in Florida. This debate has gone on for years, it seems they are creating a system of accountability with “all deliberate speed”. We need a national drug tracking system that tracks addictive drugs. If Perdue said it wouldn’t sell oxycotton in Florida until they created a tracking system, I expect they would have a system up and running in less than a month.
Michael

Drug Dealers and Phama CEO have many of the same qualities and thinking when they are pushing drugs. Phama just works within the law they created to do so, bribing Doctors. Ma just reversed a bill in the state house making it easier to do so (http://www.massdevice.com/news/gift-ban-mass-house-votes-repeal-law-regulating-companies-gifts-doctors)

Ever see those commercials? x drug may stops depression,side effects may cause suicidal thoughts, blood clouts, loss of hair, heart attack, etc.

Always amazes me when I hear people talk about how pot should stay illegal who than go on poping pills. Also any collation of the increase in diagnoses of kids with ADD and prescriptions abuse? You may have a family/person calling for banning pot while at the same time there grandparents,children,wife/husband and themselves are all taking pills daily.
Michael

Drug Dealers and Phama CEO have many of the same qualities and thinking when they are pushing drugs. Phama just works within the law they created to do so, bribing Doctors. Ma just reversed a bill in the state house making it easier to do so (http://www.massdevice.com/news/gift-ban-mass-house-votes-repeal-law-regulating-companies-gifts-doctors)

Ever see those commercials? x drug may stops depression,side effects may cause suicidal thoughts, blood clouts, loss of hair, heart attack, etc.

Always amazes me when I hear people talk about how pot should stay illegal who than go on poping pills. Also any collation of the increase in diagnoses of kids with ADD and prescriptions abuse? You may have a family/person calling for banning pot while at the same time there grandparents,children,wife/husband and themselves are all taking pills daily.
Cathy

Doctors and dentists are at fault here for prescribing unnecessary painkillers in unnecessary amounts. My young teenaged son had oral surgery and received a prescription for 30 percocet or percodan oxycodone pills. He took only one. When he said he wanted more because he liked that they made him feel “loopy,” I tossed out the rest. He used one more Tylenol and was fine in one day.

Had he kept those pills, he could have sold them on the “market” for more than pocket change. I’m sure this must happen all the time. Parents are unaware. And the kids are stealing grandma and grandpa’s pills, too.
Kurt

We no longer allow liquor and cigarette manufacturers to advertise on TV. Why is BigPharma allowed to advertise drugs to the mass public when only physicians and dentists may decide what to prescribe? The “Ask your doctor whether X is right for you” line is just drug pushing by another name.
Brandstadisbad

I really don’t care about this story. There are so many other stories out there that affect us all that this one doesn’t even warrant discussion.

Steve McCraw, Texas Department of Public Safety director, said 22 murders, 24 assaults, 15 shootings and five kidnappings in Texas were linked to Mexican cartels since 2010.
- ThresherK
  
  Wow. Looks like someone got his talking points down pat.
- Anonymous
  
  Drug addiction is a huge problem in this country, I for one welcome a program such as this one. By the way your comment is kind off subject but I’ve posted some real statistics from the Texas Department of Public Safety. Seems more whites committed the crimes mentioned than any other race or creed. By the way there are not official stats for crime for 2010 by the Texas Department if Safety.
  
  Here’s a few stats from TDPS’s own data:
  
  Murder: Whites: 486 Hispanics: 351
  
  Aggravated assault: Whites: 15,139 Hispanics: 9,108
  
  Other assaults: Whites: 71,008 Hispanics: 47,799
  
  http://www.txdps.state.tx.us/administration/crime_records/pages/crimestatistics.htm
Ellen Dibble

Can addicts be declared disabled (eventually, if their bodies deteriorate) and get Medicaid? As far as I know, this happens with illegal drugs, but I suppose you can become disabled from prescription addictions as well. Interesting predicament for a doctor. Do you admit you cannot treat the patient’s physical and/or psyche pain, given the resources you have, and therefore distribute the adult equivalent of jelly beans? And then there is a vicious circle, because the cure and the cause have conglomerated? The doctor tells the investigator that the individual is a physical wreck, however that is described, and it is a kind of statement of defeat of the culture and the medical system. I suppose this has been more or less the case since the year one.
Ellen Dibble

Can addicts be declared disabled (eventually, if their bodies deteriorate) and get Medicaid? As far as I know, this happens with illegal drugs, but I suppose you can become disabled from prescription addictions as well. Interesting predicament for a doctor. Do you admit you cannot treat the patient’s physical and/or psyche pain, given the resources you have, and therefore distribute the adult equivalent of jelly beans? And then there is a vicious circle, because the cure and the cause have conglomerated? The doctor tells the investigator that the individual is a physical wreck, however that is described, and it is a kind of statement of defeat of the culture and the medical system. I suppose this has been more or less the case since the year one.
Chris B

The pharmaceutical industry as a whole is dirtier than the illegal drug trade. At least the illegals are up front about what they’re in it for!
Agnosticdodug

Prescriptions drugs work, that is why they are huge sellers.
Ever have PSTD?, dark depression. It is real. PTSD drugs, SSRI’s work
Side-effects dissipate usually within 3-4 mo.
Continual stress/depression can cause others issues – thyroid gland can falter after years of untreated stress/depression
get the facts
Rickevans033050

Even crack dealers can’t advertise on TV. But big PharMA can. And, fueled by grandma’s Medicare card or your parents’ Blue Cross/Blue Shield who needs to fuel your addiction with B&Es.
- Zeno
  
  Don’t forget the TV Dramas that push addiction. The House medical drama
  not only pushes that Vicodin addiction as normal and necessary behavior, but you can remain a fully alert highly paid genius while using it.
  
  Its the same as the 24 drama pushing torture as normal and necessary for the unrelenting unseen terrorist threat.
Michael

I need to add my two cents yes maybe we have a problem with people getting loaded on prescription medications but I no from experience that the real crime is having to go to this wacko drs to get a prescription in the first place. I need medication to live, but I can not afford the visit or the Medication once it is perscribed. Leave us alone go after the Rush Limbaughs, and leave us sick people in need alone.
S.S.

What about “rehabilitation” drugs – I know several people who take suboxone, a treatment for opioid dependence, and the “subs” are more addictive and have a much more pronounced withdrawal symptoms than other opiates (so I’ve read). The doctors that prescribe them (at least, the ones I know of) are hustlers – they don’t speak with their patients for more than 15 minutes and don’t reduce the dosage in the suggested amount of time – I know people who have been on it for upwards of a year – does that sound like treatment to you? I know one person who is taking them for dependence and she is no longer taking opiates, but she cannot function without the suboxone – and another young man who gets his prescription, sells them to other addicts and uses the money to buy heroin, and fakes his drug tests every other month (oh, and the doctor doesn’t drug test regularly). I former addicts who would rather have bought methadone than pain pills because it lasts longer!
- S.S.
  
  This is in Mississippi, by the way.
Brandstad

Could this just be a symptom of the current economic outlook?

Suicide by prescription drug?
http://profiles.google.com/shannon.stoney shannon stoney

I live in rural east TN. I have a friend whose daughter and son-in-law are addicted to pain pills. They have five children under the age of about 7. Last year, the young parents ran away–to Kentucky–without telling anybody they were leaving. They left the five small children with their grandmother, in a trailer. The grandmother knew they were gone because all the spoons were missing. (Apparently they use spoons to cook the pills.)

These young people were uneducated and had very poor job prospects. They had children very young, the mother beginning at about 16. The young father had an alcohol problem as well. I hope that the children will be ok, but it’s hard to imagine them not being hurt by this.
- Gregg
  
  You must know Elizabeth.
BongBaby

WAIT A SECOND …”a bigger epidemic than marijuana…”

Did you really just say that?

NAME ONE person who’d died of an overdose of Marijuana?

These types of flippant comments need to be reviewed. Come on Tom, pass the bong, not the judgement.
- Gregg
  
  I don’t think the term “epidemic” has anything to do with overdosing or death. It’s simply means widespread. Don’t be so defensive. Put down the bong and back away.
BongBaby

WAIT A SECOND …”a bigger epidemic than marijuana…”

Did you really just say that?

NAME ONE person who’d died of an overdose of Marijuana?

These types of flippant comments need to be reviewed. Come on Tom, pass the bong, not the judgement.
William

How many people die each year behind the wheel of a car? We live in a free society and have a segment of society that will abuse drugs. It is how it is and will always be in our country.
elizabeth

I live in rural tennessee. I know a young family where both parents are addicted to pain medicine. They have five small children. A year ago, both young parents ran away to KY, leaving their five small children with the grandparents. I don’t think this would have happened if it hadn’t been for the addiction.
Andy Taylor

With illegal drugs being SO expensive and hard to get these days. Where does one get this “oxy?”
- Andy Taylor
  
  We are an addicted society. Our system encourages addiction to spending money we don’t have on things we don’t need. We live in a sea of advertising where everyone and everything is trying to sell us something. Is it any surprise the people turn to drugs: alcohol, tobacco, caffeine, meth, prescription painkillers …?
  
  I’ve not experienced this addiction personally. It sounds like I’m one of the lucky ones. Still I can’t help but see this epidemic as part of a larger problem, one that cannot be easily remedied without a substantial change in our society.
Charles

I was hooked on opiates for 6 years, it was hell when I ran out of pills. Finely I found Suboxone, instant relief.

Been clean 6 years.

Charles
Dave

I live in a small Kentucky town and recently served on the grand jury. In one day, we heard at least 55 different cases related to prescription drug dealing. Almost all of the were traced to the Ky-Florida pipeline. In many cases, the drug runners were very organized – one person would drive a van on regular trips to pain clinics in Florida, filled with people who each paid a fee for some of the action. Each person would see a “doctor”, have an MRI, and check out with a large jug of 250 pills each. The trip organizer would skim off a percentage of pills, while each traveler would deal the remainder in the local community.

The Commonwealth Attorneys kept reiterating that they and we were powerless to do anything about the pill pipeline, as Florida would not agree to deal with the problem.
Paul

One unintended consequence of “going to war” on prescription drug abuse is that many doctors are now so scared of the DEA that they are unwilling to prescribe something that actually kills your pain.

Fractured a bone falling on the ice a couple of years ago… Tylenol with codine? Are you kidding me?
- Kurt
  
  Codeine is chemically related to oxy-codone (see the similar name?). Codeine is also addictive.
Goldstein

Milwaukee, WI, Sentjnel article 2 Apr 2011

UW a force in pain drug growth

Research group receiving millions from pharmaceutical firms helped liberalize use of opioids

University professors paid for by pharmaceutical companies to push doctors to prescribe these addictive drugs. The situation is ridiculous!

Joe Goldstein

Waitsfield, VT
- Zeno
  
  Ever wonder if the Afghanistan invasion was really about restoring the production of opiates? Those evil Taliban had destroyed over 90% of the worlds production of opiates.
  - Kurt
    
    Read the history of the Iran-Contra war. It’s the same war.
Annieb31357

People who are battling addiction to prescription and other substances can be effectively treated with Suboxone through doctors’ offices, but most of our local docctors don’t (won’t?) offer this treatment. It often appears that they prefer to play it safe and protect themselves and their business by denying legitimate pain patients and working against the establishment of Suboxone / methodone treatment facilities in their “service” area
Dkuhn2

I recently retired and moved away from West Virginia, and saw the OxyContin epidemic explode. The medical community is not blameless. Many doctors make big profits from Medicaid, Medicare, and United Mines Workers insurance through 5-minute “appointments” for these drugs, and Perdue Pharma (the manufacturer), makes it even more profitable for them to foster drug addiction, in my opinion.
- Andy Taylor
  
  I agree with you. It’s all about profit.
  
  Our society’s business model calls for endless expansion and short-term strategies. Big Pharma doesn’t care that they are killing their customers any more than Big Tobacco does. They only care about increasing the value of their stock so the shareholders will continue to invest. Addicts are regular customers until they become collateral damage.
Dave L

Here in Nashville, as prescription opiates have increased in price, cheaper illegal opiates have become far more common than in the past. I have worked in addiction services, and the number of heroin addicts here has exploded, a far more widespread epidemic than crack cocaine that touches a much wider variety of social classes. Sadly, the demand for both drugs and drug treatment continues to grow relentlessly.
Mason Smith

I need the program to tell how a person might get addicted to oxycodone prescribed for pain from an injury like mine: a cracked sacrum from a car accident. I am on fentanyl patches, medium strength, with oxycodone and acetominaphen pills and valium to take if the pain becomes a problem, “breaks through” the fentanyl. I try to do without the extra pills but after two days on only fentanyl, last night I gave in and took ocycodone/acetop=minaphen (10-325) twice. Am I typical of people who become addicted? The program is good, but it’s more about the criminal aspects of the epidemic and leaves me in ignorance about my own risks.
- Rickevans033050
  
  I agree with you, Mason. I wish the program would have someone(s) on who used these pain killers legitimately and avoided addiction.
- Jess
  
  Unfortunately, you are at high risk for becoming addicted. Many people just like myself get an injury and then if you are on the meds for long enough your body no doubt becomes addicted. What follows next is your mind also becomes addicted. The brain tells you that you need all of that medication to make you feel better and you very well may need all of it. That is the scary part. Honestly i would talk to your doctor about this because these are all valid concerns and i would hate to see you end up with another huge problem on your hands.
Jess

Im a 29 year old female and i fell vicitim to the awful affects of painkillers. It first started out with an injury and from there i searched for pills where ever i could get them. Family and friends medicine cabinets, calling people i knew could get them and the worst was going to the hospital and pretending that i was hurt just to get something. The sad thing is it worked quite often. Mostly for percocet and vicodin. One day it didnt seem like enough so someone introduced me to oxycontin and it was over from there. It made me feel like i could take care of everything i needed to and not get tired. That was its appeal to me. That went on for a couple of years when it became to be too much and way too expensive. On average costing 60-80 per 80mg pill. I finally made the decision to go to a methadone clinic and that is what truly helped me. I have tried other detox and outpatient programs but with little success.
Jess

Im a 29 year old female and i fell vicitim to the awful affects of painkillers. It first started out with an injury and from there i searched for pills where ever i could get them. Family and friends medicine cabinets, calling people i knew could get them and the worst was going to the hospital and pretending that i was hurt just to get something. The sad thing is it worked quite often. Mostly for percocet and vicodin. One day it didnt seem like enough so someone introduced me to oxycontin and it was over from there. It made me feel like i could take care of everything i needed to and not get tired. That was its appeal to me. That went on for a couple of years when it became to be too much and way too expensive. On average costing 60-80 per 80mg pill. I finally made the decision to go to a methadone clinic and that is what truly helped me. I have tried other detox and outpatient programs but with little success.
Jonathan

What does domeone do with leftover Oxycodone? I had a tooth extracted and probably took onepill, and now I have this whole vial left. How do I dispose of these so they do not fall into the wrong wrong hands?
- Jess
  
  Honestly you can just flush them down the toilet. I do believe that some hospitals or doctor offices also take unused medication back as well. Hope this helps.
  - Jonathan
    
    I guess that would work, but I am not sure I want opiates (or any other drug) in the water supply. But it would get them out of my medicine cabinet. I wonder what the pharmacy would do if I turned them in?
  - http://gregorycamp.wordpress.com/ Greg Camp
    
    No, you don’t flush them. Our rivers are being filled with prescription medicines, causing damage to fish populations and the environment in general.
  - Zeno
    
    Throw them out with the trash. Not in the bottle but loose. Nobody scrounges a landfill for loose pills, even if they could find them.
    
    Or just bury them in the backyard. Bacteria eat everything that people can eat.
- Messengercoffee
  
  your local police station may have a collection for unused prescriptions. also, some senior citizen centers do this.
  - Kurt
    
    Unfortunately the police have sometimes been distributors/sellers, too. A few cases of that in MA and NH recently. Best to bury the extra pills.
Ed Siefker

America needs to take a page from Portugal. Legalizing small amounts of all drugs has lead to a decrease in drug use, and related public health problems. Addiction should never be a law enforcement issue. Heroin maintenance programs in the UK, Holland, and again Portugal has proven that addicts can become productive members of society when they are not compelled to spend all their time and money in drug seeking behavior. Give these people a clean, safe place to satiate their urges and we can all live better lives.
Ed P, LMHC

I don’t see Big Pharma, pharmacies or doctors addressing the problem in any meaningful way. They all contribute to these drugs getting to the street by irresponsible distribution, over prescribing and ignorance or indifference to the potential harm they cause.
Annieb31357

Don’t put them in the water supply by flushing them.

State police here have a “pill dragon” that makes the rounds of towns, where you can turn in and they’ll destroy unwanted Rx’s…
john g.

What should the role of government be in addressing this problem? KY Sen. Rand Paul during his campaign denied that KY had a drug problem or certainly downplayed it. Drug problems are a personal problem and gov. isn’t the answer. It seems to me that better and more strict regulations is a common sense start. It seems that state-level laws are uneven and drug users and profiters take advantage of this uneven geography. john g. (kentucky)
Dodie

Let’s not kid ourselves in the urban Northeast. As a family therapist in suburban Boston, I can attest that the epidemic is here also. Also if our motor vehical deaths happen to be higher than our overdose mortality it is only a technicality because many are undoubtedly related to drug use, whether people are high or suffering from withdrawl.
http://politywonk.wordpress.com/ Elz Curtiss

There’s an intersection here between the shortage of jobs for nurses as the middle-level of delivery-with-integrity for major medications. I remember the presence of the Hospice nurse, during my grandfather’s final illness, whose oversight monitored the total use in our household. With the huge expansion of at-home palliative care, we need to develop a similar system, and then fund it with an understanding that it will be solving two social problems: patients who need help with chronic pain and communities who need strong drugs carefully administered by professionals.
Keith

“Coping skills” that last commenter made?! It’s taken because it FEELS good!
- http://www.facebook.com/wendylwilliamsboston Wendy Langlois Williams
  
  Exactly her point!!! We all have “pain” or “troubles” and learning to cope with them without escaping by feeling good will help deal with real life…
  - Brett
    
    This is an excellent comment! It gets right to the essence of addiction in a very direct way.
jack

Tom, I’m a 21-year resident of FL. This state is corrupt, top-to-bottom. A neighboring city to where I live – Delray Beach – is one of the Pill-Mill Capitals of the state. I live in S. FL, which is the most corrupt part of the state.

jack
Deb

I live in Florida and as a medical rep have called on Pain Management doctors for years. One reason that the problem got so out of hand is that doctors make a considerable amount of money on the pain meds that they dispense from their office and they fought long and hard not to give up this source of income. Pain doctors – both legitimate and pill mills — are part of the problem. It’s all about the money.
- Ed P, LMHC
  
  HOW ABOUT THE IRRESPONSIBLE ADVERTISING AND DISTRBUTION BY YOUR INDUSTRY?
Messengercoffee

my mother collected narcotic pain relief prescriptions for back pain from various md’s that she had ongoing relationships with. too bad she was addicted by the time she had surgery for back pain, and no one would believe that this 77 year old was having withdrawal symptoms post op.
Nortoncharlie

What happens to all the addicts when we dry up the supply? Are they criminals or victims.
Cd8ed

As an addict, if you want to get off Oxy’s, I believe the best way so far is Methadone or Suboxone. A clinic in Omaha NE does it correctly. They offer counselling, and are trying to see the difference between someone who sincerely wants to use methadone to help themselves, and those who just want another way to avoid being dopesick, and are not ready to quit yet.
Manon

Hi I live in New Hampshire and have teenagers. I have been hearing about “prescriptions pills” going around in parties, kind of “the new thing”. Why ? I asked them . Easy access, doesn’t smell like pot , don’t get in trouble for having a bud, pot is illegal, pills are cheaper . A lot of them doesn’t see the pills as very addictive and dangerous.It’s getting bad with adolescence.
Paula

As an Occupational Therapist who works with a lot of these folks who end up in nursing homes and sub-acute rehabilitation,can get by in their twenties. Once they reach their thirties and forties start dealing with diseases of aging. Their internal organs start breaking down and they start premature aging. By the time they are in their early forties these folks are worse off than most of the ninety year olds we see.
Cd8ed

Also, i have been “out of the loop” for a few years. I have heard that pill makers are somehow making them so they cannot be injected or snorted?
By the way, the name is my junk mail user name for putting in public places like this.
- Jess
  
  Yes Purdue, i believe is the one who has added a gel like substance so the pills cannot be snorted or injected. Problem is that the addiction is soo strong that people are still trying to inject it and have been put in serious danger when the gel becomes lodged in their veins. People are experimenting with different techniques to see if the can cook the gel out of the pill. Some have been quite successful
- Jess
  
  Yes Purdue, i believe is the one who has added a gel like substance so the pills cannot be snorted or injected. Problem is that the addiction is soo strong that people are still trying to inject it and have been put in serious danger when the gel becomes lodged in their veins. People are experimenting with different techniques to see if the can cook the gel out of the pill. Some have been quite successful
Cd8ed

Also, i have been “out of the loop” for a few years. I have heard that pill makers are somehow making them so they cannot be injected or snorted?
By the way, the name is my junk mail user name for putting in public places like this.
http://www.facebook.com/wendylwilliamsboston Wendy Langlois Williams

While
there is a significant problem with prescription drug abuse, MANY more people
suffer due to poorly treated pain. Pain resulting from injury or disease (tissue
damage) that is inadequately treated results in changes in the brain which… keep signaling
“pain” even after the original injury is healed. This is chronic pain which we
now know is actually a disease in itself. Dealing with chronic pain costs our
country over 100 billion dollars according to the NIH. Providers get scared to
treat pain because of the abuse of the “few”. We discuss this and many complex
matters around pain in the Pain Research, Education & Policy grad degree
program at Tufts School of Medicine here in Boston (tufts.edu/med/prep). Our
vision is to promote the fundamental human right to be free of needless
pain/suffering. This is a multi-faceted conversation that deserves many more
minds at work.
- Ed P, LMHC
  
  WHICH DRUG COMPANY DO YOU WORK FOR?
  - http://www.facebook.com/wendylwilliamsboston Wendy Langlois Williams
    
    I do not work for a drug company. I work in higher education at Tufts University School of Medicine in the Pain Research, Education and Policy program (tufts.edu/med/prep)
Ellen Dibble

Isn’t there some chemical compound that can give a stressed out individual a period of relief without becoming entrenched in an addictive way? The woman Tara I think who called and said college graduates look for a way to deal with a frustrating economy and prescription drugs are available. Are these drugs by definition addictive?
Richmint

There is a saying in the treatment industry that no one ever became addicted to something they never tried! The key is the advertising of pharmaceuticals. We’ve become convinced that only long-acting, high-powered prescriptions are effective for pain relief! It is routine been to give or offer prescriptions for Vicodin and Oxycodone at the dentist. After a recent shoulder surgery, I filled the prescription for Oxycodone in case the pain was very bad, but just took aspirin with great frequency and used ice compresses to relieve the pain. But no one is advocating for aspiring and ice because there is no money to be made there. And lest someone point out the side effects of aspirin, be aware they do not include burglarizing your neighborhood, destroying your family, or long-term addiction and jail.
JWoodsJr4

I am a former newspaper reporter from the Western part of Massachusetts now living in Boston. I’ve had an addiction to percocet/oxycodone for 25 years. I’ve been through countless detoxes and rehabs. I’ve been able to work, but when I do not have access to the drug, I am useless. There are ways to get through the day, including non-narcotics that help alleviate the symptoms, the use of which is information gleaned from other patients while in detox.

I’ve been on methodone twice, and at one point attended daily AA meetings, neither of which was any help.

This problem is just as prevalent here in Boston as in Appalacia, which I am sure anyone listening to the show who has this problem can confirm. Just this morning I purchased 50 percocet for $300, the average going rate of $6 per pill.

I have had numerous physical problems that now gives me a legitimate prescription each month, but it is gone within a week. The problem with this entire scenario, and the reason that this is even a topic for discussion is that the use of these drugs without a prescription is illegal, unlike alcohol.

Any day of the week there are homeless alcoholics laying on the ground in the Common and in and around Downtown Crossing. And in any detox, the alcoholics stand out with their far more physical distress than the opiate users.

For any educated person, drilled by professors and teachers in the art of critical thinking, the philosophy of NA and AA to essentially stop thinking and allow the “program” to carry you away to with sobriety. Without exception, every rehab facility subscribes to the 12-step ideal, essentially dooming anyone who has any independant thought process
- Ed Siefker
  
  “I’ve been able to work, but when I do not have access to the drug, I am useless.”
  
  This is such an important point. When maintained addicts can lead productive lives. Dr William Halsted, for instance, carried on a brilliant surgical career while maintaining an addiction to morphine. He went on to co-found Johns Hopkins.
  
  Now not every addict is a surgeon, but they deserve the chance to contribute positively to society instead of being stigmatized and thrown in jail.
- Ed Siefker
  
  “I’ve been able to work, but when I do not have access to the drug, I am useless.”
  
  This is such an important point. When maintained addicts can lead productive lives. Dr William Halsted, for instance, carried on a brilliant surgical career while maintaining an addiction to morphine. He went on to co-found Johns Hopkins.
  
  Now not every addict is a surgeon, but they deserve the chance to contribute positively to society instead of being stigmatized and thrown in jail.
JWoodsJr4

I am a former newspaper reporter from the Western part of Massachusetts now living in Boston. I’ve had an addiction to percocet/oxycodone for 25 years. I’ve been through countless detoxes and rehabs. I’ve been able to work, but when I do not have access to the drug, I am useless. There are ways to get through the day, including non-narcotics that help alleviate the symptoms, the use of which is information gleaned from other patients while in detox.

I’ve been on methodone twice, and at one point attended daily AA meetings, neither of which was any help.

This problem is just as prevalent here in Boston as in Appalacia, which I am sure anyone listening to the show who has this problem can confirm. Just this morning I purchased 50 percocet for $300, the average going rate of $6 per pill.

I have had numerous physical problems that now gives me a legitimate prescription each month, but it is gone within a week. The problem with this entire scenario, and the reason that this is even a topic for discussion is that the use of these drugs without a prescription is illegal, unlike alcohol.

Any day of the week there are homeless alcoholics laying on the ground in the Common and in and around Downtown Crossing. And in any detox, the alcoholics stand out with their far more physical distress than the opiate users.

For any educated person, drilled by professors and teachers in the art of critical thinking, the philosophy of NA and AA to essentially stop thinking and allow the “program” to carry you away to with sobriety. Without exception, every rehab facility subscribes to the 12-step ideal, essentially dooming anyone who has any independant thought process
Cabmanjohnny

What will happen over this problem in Kentucky, of which I am a resident, is more laws and enhanced police state mentality. Poor and powerless people will not get treatment but punishment. Those in real pain will be refused treatment out of big brother fears by doctors. The staff of government agencies will grow as will the private prison system.
This is a problem of self oversight by the medical community.
Tom Anderson

Please continue work on this topic. Please follow up on this with another show!
Ellen JB

The problem is the drugs themselves and how they’re prescribed. I recently was given a prescription for Tylenol with Codine for as yet undiagnosed abdominal pain. Last week I took the medicine as prescribed (1 tablet every 6 hours) and found after two days that it no longer worked. That is the moment, when you take the drug and nothing changes, where many people will “double-up” and take a second pill. I don’t do that so I looked for other solutions. But the point is that the medications have built into them problems of addictions because you need more and more of the medication to get the same relief. People need more options, more ways of dealing with pain. I asked a doctor for a muscle relaxer to use instead of the Codine but was turned down – I’m sure this is about an old bias against muscle relaxers in terms of abuse. I chose to take some Darvon 65 which I still have and is much less addictive but for some reason has been taken off the market by the FDA. My doctor prescribed 60 tablets of “acetaminaphen-cod #3″ which alone is shocking. The quantity suggests an assumption that I will need a lot of it and ignores the dangers of the medication.

When in doubt, I think other things like over the counter medications are still worth trying. Also relaxation techniques, hot baths, ice, walking if possible to relieve stress, hypnosis etc. should be considered. A Tylenol PM contains Benedryl which can relax the body and help you get a good night’s sleep. If pain is extreme and medicine stops working I think we should all go back to the doctors and demand a better treatment but taking more and more of the same medication is a mistake that will lead to this problem of addiction.

I personally feel the medical profession is both careless and ill-informed in the way they choose what to prescribe and how little attention they pay to their patient’s pain management. The entire way of dealing with addiction causes much of this problem. I would disagree with the person who said everyone has the potential of becoming addicted. We all have choices. Many people like myself will never be addicted to anything and should not be forced to suffer because others are so inclined. And those who become addicted should not automatically be treated badly, as if they have done something wrong instead of being badly treated by their doctors.
Brendan

This is not a comment against 12 step abstinence programs, which have helped millions of people. However, the studies I’ve seen and in my own experience, replacement therapy & harm reduction are much more effective for opiate addiction. I was able to get off of Oxycontin by receiving Suboxone treatment from a pain management clinic here in Omaha, while also seeing a therapist with experience treating addiction. Replacement therapy is meant to counteract post acute withdrawal symptoms, which make it difficult to stay clean even if you make it through the hell of acute withdrawal. It’s certainly not a magic bullet. It’s also very expensive and therefore not an option for many people. The new health care law helps in some respect because it eliminates lifetime caps and replaces them with yearly caps. Even including paying my high deductible, this change would have saved me thousands of dollars. There is help out there.
Annieb31357

Re formulating meds so they “can’t” be snorted, or crushed and shot up or whatever: a friend of mine (here in KY) who’s being treated with Suboxone confirms that if Suboxone is taken any way but as it’s intended to be used (I think it’s designed to be dissolved under the tongue), not only does it not produce a “buzz,” but it also actually loses its effectiveness.

On the subject of the absolute insanity of the whole situation with doctors, medicines and their “proper” use: my friend being treated with Suboxone IS addicted to opiates – the result of years of prescription meds for pain from major skeletal injuries in an auto accident. He is disabled, and lives with pain every day. And Suboxone is, he says, remarkably effective at relieving his pain — without producing any semblance of a “high.”

BUT because its official prescribed purpose is ONLY to help with addiction issues, he must seek treatment with this medication ostensibly for addiction relief ONLY — with the cooperation of his understanding doctor — but for the actual purpose of achieving effective pain relief so he can live with some semblance of normalcy.

These “clinics” (usually just part of a doctor’s over-all practice in his private office) typically require that a patient “complete” his or her treatment in a year’s time or something like that, so it’s really not a long-term solution for a chronic pain patient who can’t find a doctor willing to “risk” treating him.
Avid Listener

I am an almost-daily listener, love Tom’s agile handling of so many diverse topics. Was sad to see one get past today, on something that so needs the contributing factors “outed” and dealt with. The pain psychologist who called in made an extremely important point: These medications are dangerous, and the people who need them are in extreme pain, and need help. This doctor spelled out what is needed: careful education, monitoring, more frequent visits to the doctor, a full pain treatment and management plan–THINGS THE INSURANCE COMPANIES WON’T PAY FOR. The doctors can decide between working for free or not giving the patients what they need–as he said, they are forced to treat “high risk patients like low risk ones.” Anyone taking these drugs is a high risk patient without proper care concurrent with the perscription, and insurance companies are preventing proper care by withholding payment. Surely this deserves deeper investigation–it could easily be a major factor in why there is such an upsurge now, when these types of drugs are so prevalent, and doctor-patient interaction so restricted by insurance companies–feeding the front end of this epidemic. What other drug addiction epidemic is so filled with honest patients coming to honest doctors, seeking help, and coming out battling a terrible addiction?
- Cathy
  
  There are also behavioral techniques, including meditation, that have decreased the need for pain medications markedly in many people. Insurance cos. don’t pay for these mind-body clinics, even when they’re in major hospitals, like UMass Worcester Med. Ctr. or Beth Israel in Boston.
Pingback: Study: Rogue Online Pharmacies Linked To Increased Drug Abuse | CommonHealth
Bill Howell

I don’t believe the attempt in this forum to find causes for the increasing level of prescription drug abuse has reached deep enough. Set aside the legitimate need for and use of these medications for pain management and the illegal use for pain management that is the result of a health care system that for a number of reasons does not fill the legitimate need legally.

Now let’s focus on the use of pain medications to mask or reduce the stresses of everyday living. If there were no stresses, there would be no demand for substances to reduce the stresses. What causes our stresses? Certainly there are conflicts, insecurity, guilt and shame. Past researchers have drawn connections between poverty and the above stresses and stress-relieving substances. Recent work by two British public health researchers, Wilkinson and Pickett, led to their publication of The Spirit Level. In that book they present meticulous and comprehensive research in thirty prosperous countries and state-by-state in the US that shows a convincing causal relationship between the degree of social and economic inequality and a whole range of social ills, including substance abuse. The incidence of social ills is significantly greater in societies where social and economic inequality is greater. And the effects are present throughout the range of social status. The cause they present for this effect is our natural human tendency to compare ourselves with others and to be anxious about where we fit on the range of social status. When the range of status is greater from top to bottom, the anxiety about our own place is greater. See their web site at: http://www.equalitytrust.org,uk
Gwen

I wonder what this is doing to insurance costs. These drugs have a high profit margin for drug deals because they can get the pills for $15 or $20. Depending on what their co-pay is. On the street these drugs will sell for $1 per mg, which means one 30mg pill will cost $30. Its more profitable than other street drugs thanks to the insurance companies picking up the costs.
- Jeff
  
  How about the cost to medicaid and medicare from your tax dollars!!
MedReturn

Communities need safe, sustainable, always-available drug collection programs to keep unused and unwanted medications from piling up in medicine cabinets and getting into the wrong hands. Concerned citizens should ask local law enforcement and their anti-drug coalitions to bring MedReturn Drug Collection Units into their communities.
http://www.medreturn.com
Tina

I’ve written about this before, but here goes: a lot of medical doctors do not understand certain musculoskeletal conditions which can lead to neuromuscular and neurological pain – chronic, excruciating pain, in some cases. Too many medical doctors think of medicines (fluids and pills) as the solution; whereas, some problems need the skilled assessment and treatment that physical therapists can provide.

One set of such conditions starts with spondylosis which is an extremely painful osteo-arthritis in the cervical spine (aka, the neck); then there are two later intensifications of spondylosis which are even worse — the third such condition can cause paralysis. Office workers are particularly at risk for spondylosis, altho they are NOT the only people; I just bring it up because most people think of sitting at a desk as benign.

Muscles need to be balanced across each joint in the body, so that one side is not much stronger than the other. When a muscle or muscle group on one side of a joint IS used more often or carries more weight, sometimes from bad postural positioning, an imbalance can occur. In spondylosis, the muscles on the front side of the neck and upper trunk are too strong; they then pull the vertebrae out of place, causing erosion to those bones. The bones then start building up spurs, supposedly to “protect themselves”, but the spurs rub away at the spinal nerve as it leaves the spinal cord to travel to various muscles in the upper body to enervate those muscles. This rubbing of the peripheral spinal nerve can be excruciatingly painful.

The pain can be localized, altho it can also and/or simultaneously spread thruout more of the body. My own personal THEORY is that fibromyalgia sometimes has this situation at its foundation; that fibromyalgia is a consequence rather than a root cause of pain — but that is my own theory from my own experience with these various conditions and from studying PT assisting (I let my license expire a long time ago, or I would not be allowed to post these ideas.). Anyway, the pain can ALSO feel like your body is just not strong enough to HOLD UP YOUR OWN HEAD! The pain can be bad enough that you almost become a little accident prone, as well.

Anyway, a skilled physical therapist, perhaps especially one with a specialty in the spine, can do lower-grade manipulations, targeted massage, and give the patient exercises that are designed to bring balance back to the muscles of the joints of the spine (how many people stop to think that they have joints in their spine?). Anyway, my story is that I suffered until I got PT help. Medicines would NOT have helped to stop the root cause. Sadly, many, many doctors do not have a strong enough sense of what physical therapy does, when PTs are actually musculo-skeletal experts, and our muscles are enervated by nerves, so their work can also help with certain kinds of nerve pain. Find a PT who has a good knowledge of the spine and who uses a lot of MANUAL therapy which they do themselves (rather than giving that work to a PT assistant or to a machine), and I think a lot of people can be saved the legal and illegal pain pills route that was being discussed today for this source of pain that is far more prevalent than most people realize.

Also, when you are typing, don’t stick your head forward (“forward head position”) ; instead try to squeeze your shoulder blades together. THAT is part of the postural position that can help prevent spondylosis in the first place.
Thanks everybody!
Tina

Anne-from-yesterday,
Anne, you called into the show & wrote into the blog. Please go back to yesterday’s blog about Asperger’s. I fear that you misunderstood my original message to you. I sent you two new messages which I hope you will see. Find your post, and mine will be beneath yours. — Tina
Airborne582000

I am a student nurse near to completion of my training. It is important to note that pain management is an important strategy in caring for patients and that most hospitalized patients are very concerned about the addictive properties of the pain medications used to treat their pain.

While it is critical that we get control of the pill mills and unethical prescribers that are a major source of the problem, we must be careful that we don’t cast a blanket of “drug seeking” across the population of those patients that have real chronic pain and find it difficult to function without these tools.

Also, Important to note; I have spoken with numerous patients who were able to reduce the amount of opioid narcotics they needed to control their pain by as much as 75% by using medical marijuana as an adjunctive component of their pain management regimen. Maybe another component of reducing the demand for opioids is for the federal government (Mr. Obama) to support re-classification and legalization of medical marijuana??
- Kurt
  
  How about Mr. Boehner, Mr. Gingrich, Ms. Bachmann, Ms. Palin, and Mr. Romney support it first?
Jane

Oxy is HUGE here in little Juneau Alaska – the Number 1 drug problem. Since we’re land-locked, one would think the “pipeline” would be easy to control.

It seems that doctors (and dentists) write Oxy prescriptions far more than need be – and for relatively minor procedures. Since this is so highly addictive and so high profile, health providers should be very selective when providing prescriptions. Also contributing to the problem are people who fill the prescriptions, don’t take all the pills, and leave them in their medicine cabinets – a great source of supply for youngsters.
Phillip

Chronic pain sufferers are being demonized as addicts.

Opioid and opiate drugs are the most effective tools to fight chronic pain.

When well managed they are safer than ibuprofen (bleeding ulcers and reflux) and tylanol (liver damage and death).

All people who take opiates for long enough will develop dependance.

The only problem is if they run out and go into withdrawal.

People who are forced to find pain relief on the black market is the real crime.
- Ed P, LMHC
  
  WHEN PEOPLE TAKE ILLEGAL DRUGS AND BECOME ADDICTED THETY ARE “ADDICTS” AND WHEN THEY TAKE PRESCRIBED DRUGS AND BECOME ADDICTED THEY ARE “DEPENDENT? SOUNDS LIKE MORE FLIM FLAM FROM BIG PHARMA TO ME.
Guest

In my understanding, the DEA is more apt to bust pharmacists for filling the prescriptions than enforcing laws against Pill Mill Docs and shutting them down.
RM

An aspect of this topic that is underreported and increasingly an issue is how these addictions are affecting infants. As the scope of narcotic addiction has worsened, the treatment of addiction in pregnancy has suffered. This has contributed to what now is a growing epidemic of infants who experience significant withdrawal from narcotics after their birth.
http://www.facebook.com/wendylwilliamsboston Wendy Langlois Williams

Interesting consensus/collaboration between the DEA and 21 health organizations

http://www.painpolicy.wisc.edu/Consensus2.pdf
guest

Its money and greed that are driving this trade, just like
so many others. Who’s making the money? The illegality isolates individuals,
who are then exploited. Does the lack of
meaningful work and poverty help create this situation? Is the legal system, police,
courts, and prisons the answer to the War on Drugs?
flopsywabbit

Another issue is the undetectability of these prescription drugs.

I’m a high schooler, and a kid I knew was seriously addicted to marijuana. After he was caught smoking at school and thus, suspended, his parents started testing him everyday for marijuana using home drug tests. Because prescription drugs were so easy to get, he switched to those, so he continued passing his drug tests at home while still feeling “high.” It got to the point where he would regularly solicit kids to steal from their parent’s medicine cabinets, and then brag about how he sold them for a major markup.It’s really sad to watch his decline. He went from AP classes to standard, “hooligan” classes in 2 years.
Guest

Prescription drugs in high school and college now are what marijuana and alcohol were when i was younger. I’m in my 30s, my youngest brother just graduated from high school (barely). By the time he turned 18 he had gone from “recreational” pill use to full-blown IV heroin addict. He comes from a good family, went to private school, had all the mental health resources and social support anyone could want. He’s now 19, living in halfway houses and homeless shelters. My hopes for him going to college, growing into an upstanding man have all been dashed (or with any luck, just postponed). I can’t begin to describe the pain my family lives in every day. As a nurse I beleive controlled substances can be a godsend in certain situations, but accessibility must be restricted. This is a far-reaching problem, well beyond rural WV. Lives are lost and families are devestated every day.
Nick

The Governor and legislature of Florida can pass a law requiring drug testing of people receiving unemployment assistance but argue against controlling the pill mills in their state. Wow.
http://profiles.google.com/akaugustson Ava Augustson

j
maryw

What a complete joke.Those women knew nothing about true pain management,nothing.I woould of loved to comment but it seemed completely one sided.No-one,no-one has the right to tell someone SUFFER,.lIKE I HAVE SAID BEFORE,GO AHEAD,PINCH YOURSELF ON THE BACK OF YOUR ARM,OK,NOW DRIVE,BETTER YET,i DONT BELIEVE IT HURTS,SO EVEN THOUGH I HAVE THE ABILITY TO STOP IT,I WILL WRITE LIES DOWN ON PAPER SO YOU LOOK LIKE THE BAD GUY OR A DRUG ADDICT,AND BY THE WAY I DONT BELIEVE YOU SO SUFFER.NOW PEOPLE WITH TRUE PAIN DONT HAVE THE CHOOSEW TO STOP IT.YOU CAN SIMPLE STOP PITCHING THE BACK OF YOUR ARM.YOUR SHOW SHOWED THE TRUE COMPLETE IGNORAMISES IN THIS COUNTRY AND COMPLETE LACK OF COMPASSION BECAUSE OF PEOPLE WHO ARE SOOOOO ARROGANT THEY CAN’T ACCEPT THAT THEY DONT KNOW EVERYTHING AND THINK THEY CAN PLAY GOD AND TELL SOMEONE HOW MUCH PHYSICAL PAIN THEY SHOULD SUFFER,THAT TORTURE IN MY BOOK,NOT ADDICTION.WHEN A MEDICINE ALLOWS SOMEONE TO FUNCTION WHY IS CALLED A ADDICTION,DO YOU CALL INSULIN A ADDICTION,SO WHY DO U CALL PAIN MANAGEMERNT A ADDICTION.AGAIN THE IGNORANT ,ARROGANT AND RICH TRY TO PLAY GOD.US MIDDLE CLASS/LOWER DO NOT HAVE THE FINICIAL MEANS TO ”PROVE IT” LET ALONE CARRY INSURANCE.THAT WILL BE THE BOTTUM LINE. NOW U THINK ITS YOUR DECISION TO TELL US HOW MUCH WE SHOULD SUFFER,WOW,WERE DID YOU GET YOUR LISCENCE,ARROGANT SILVER SPOON COLLEGE.OH AND YOUR ABSOLUTELLY IGNORANT COMMENT ON METHODONE,SHOW AGAIN HOW LITTL U KNOW ABOUT TRUE PAIN MANAGEMENT.METHADONE IS USE AS A PAIN KILLER MORON,NOT AS A WAY TO GET OFF YOUR MEDS.BOY I WOULD OF LOVED TO HAVE HAD THE CHANCE TO TELL THE WORLD THE TRUTH ABOUT THIS SUBJECT,BUT AGAIN AS USUAL PEOPLE DONT WANT THE TRUTH,THEY WANT WHAT FITS INTO THERE SHOW.MW
OnPointListener

I think I may have prompted Tom and crew to do this story. About 3 weeks ago, I read a story in the NYT about a town in southern Ohio that has been ravaged by opiates. Reading this and having battled addiction myself, and being a HUGE On Point daily listener, it prompted me to call On Point. I spoke with a really nice lady who listened politely and said she would pitch this to Tom and team. Anyways, I’m so very glad Tom took it on, even if if not prompted by my request.

This is the most significant drug epidemic our country has EVER experienced, and it’s all marketed by big pharma.

ANYONE WHO DOES THESE DRUGS, WHETHER YOU FOLLOW THE BOTTLE OR NOT, WILL BECOME ADDICTED. PERIOD.

Question – who does more harm to the US? Al Quaeda or opiates? Which kills more and destroys more lives?

Wake up America!
- Mark
  
  You should be ashamed of yourself.
- Cmwmkw
  
  Do you have chronic pain yourself? Do you have psychical ability to be able to tell how much pain someone is in? Let me tell u a quick story. Being a women, for one, it started when I was 28, I am now 45. Chest pain so bad I would drop to the ground, at 28. Doctors telling me it’s in my head, see a shrink, blah, blah, blah. A clinic in Minnesota couldn’t find the cause, and could not explain e.k.g.’s that should of killed me, killed me, do you here that! Barely able to walked into a pain clinic in West Allis Wi, buckled over in pain for 7 to 8 years of complete suffering, doctors like, chest x-ray, oh sh-t her lung is collasped. M.R.I. oh sh-t there is a tumor the size of a large egg in the spinal column pressing the spinal cord to the left. 2 years after that 17 cardiac ablations to get rid of a bad electrical pathway on the back of my heart, guess where, right behind where the tumor was inside my spinal column, inside the maylin lining right next to the cord. T-3, thru T-8. Know a vet, same thing, your anxiety ridden, your a drug addict, ooops broken vertabra T-3 thru T-9, breaks all thru his bones in that section of the backbone. He is still suffering. Because of people like ”wake up america” Your archaic ideaology because of your complete ignorance hurts people. U don’t want to understand, because it’s not you. It’s called compassion for others, but people with no conscience are not capable of compassion. The ‘me’ generation. We are talking about the section of spine that controls your breathing, all the nerve ending over your chest, your stomach. So it hurt to speak, cough eat breath, to simply live. And it is because of people like you 2 and all the others, the 3 lady commentatores that people like us are forced to suffer. That is exactly what this about, because that will be the bottom line. Doctors will be more terrified to give the needed medicine to function, to breath without pain, to laugh without pain. You have that priviledge, good for you. Some of us dont!!!!! Don’t throw statistic at me, there are human beings behind those numbers,you don’t know there stories and how many more woman, or other nurses and doctors simple choose not to do the work involved to truly determine the source of someones physical pain, based on someones looks, where there from, or lies put on paper from nurses who are just pissed off because their e.r. is filling up. Also the other half of this is because of people like ”wake-up america” or the ladies on your show, that many doctors don’t even have access to a pain managemnet center because of the lies you people are spewing out here and on that program. M.W.
  - OnPointListener
    
    I certainly did not mean to place any blame on anyone really. I think my post came out wrong. These medicines work wonders for pain, I can vouch for that. But I wish they were not so highly physically addictive. Prolonged use will result in physical addiction, I don’t care who you are.
    
    I’m sorry that you have experienced so much pain. I work with someone who just had a spinal cyst removed and they really suffered. THere’s nothing you can do but treat the pain with these meds, or suffer, but who would want to go through that. Again, apologies for coming across as judgmental.
    - Cmwmkw
      
      Sir, a cyst is less then 1 inch in circumfrence ,a tumor is larger then 1 inch in circumfrence.3 and a half inches long,2inches wide,smacked inside the mylin lining,ie sub archaniod tumor,pushing a spinal cord to the left by 2 inches is very painful,now let it sit there for years,while people call u crazy,a baby,your a lier ,you just want drugs,your a drug addict.All the slanderous name the pharmicious,the e.r. nurses,the doctors will use when they choose not to believe someone..Well now I am just as judgemental to all who choose to call people who need meds to simple function in life,like the 3 commentatores on that show.I said there is a very easy way to tell the liers from the tru painmanagement candidates.Admit them,knock them out,ask them under sodium pentathol where there pain is,they wont lie under that stuff,trust me.The bottum line will make people suffer more then they already are.mw
Mark

I am 61 years old and the media has been reporting on one drug epidemic or another for my entire life. Meth was all the rage a few years ago and as a result states have restricted the use of the most effective decongestant available because it contains pseudoephedrine. Now meth users are buying “ice” produced in Mexico which is less expensive and much more pure.
These hysterical media drug rants have actually aggravated the problems they claim to expose. The DEA is a case in point. A complete waste of taxpayer money. Just once, instead of becoming hysterical and selling lots of advertising, could interview experts on why people become addicted and what to do if you need help? It would be much more productive.
Cmwmkw

p.s. Also you people who know nothing about true pain management ,again they don’t use methadone to get off of anything it is used as a pain management medication, just like oxycodone ,which btw is not oxycotine. Also ,dahhhs ,it is sooo easy to tell the difference between the lyers and real pain, hospitals or e.r. who really want to help stop your physical pain won’t lie on paper about you and call u all kinds of slanderous names to get you out of there e.r. or to make it impossible for you to ever get true help w/meds to stop your physical pain. If you knew anything about this very needed medical profession, good people will admit you. Then they will knock your butt out with sodium pentathol [sp] and simply ask you. When you have people on your show that completely disregard the truth for there own agenda, it can and will hurt the people who truly need the medications. That will be the bottom line. Oh, and btw all these pain clinics that tell you to control your pain by seeing a shrink, b.s.! your not stupid, you know how much it hurts, only meds will help true physical pain sufferers, and again, no one has the right to tell them how much they should suffer. The word therapist alone, look at it, “the rapist”, in my mind meaning they will take your money and do nothing to stop your physical pain. M.W.
- Boobobjenkins
  
  WOW your statement about Methadone not being used to get off of anything is completely WRONG. They have thousands of Methadone clinics all across the US to help people get off of Opiates as well as Heroin. Now Hush Yo Mouff
Homer

There is so much blame to go around; A national tragedy of massive scope, sick and criminal. I have formed some firm assumptions:
1. Big Pharma (criminally, I believe) initially misrepresented these drugs as “non-habit forming”, which they knew to be false all along, and has done nothing to fix the situation, actually stepping up promotion. They also initially promoted (Oxy, etc.) with small town doctors, to be under the radar for a while, then later telling doctors in larger markets how many prescriptions had been written already. Quite a slimy plot.
2. The FDA is largely ineffective, inept and corrupt for letting this get as far as it has. Don’t tell me that regulation would make it harder for legitimate use by people with chronic pain. There is a way to regulate anything if the FDA actually wants to. Not a conspiracy theorist, but I believe the FDA is in the pocket of Big Pharma, starting back during the age of “W”‘s deregulation. Check FDA big shots for new houses, cars, lavish vacations circa 2002. Someone, please check.
3. I used to hold Doctors in high esteem until this scandal and tragedy has unfolded over the last 15 years. A doctor who writes a script for Oxy (or similar) for a (simple) fractured wrist, ankle, etc., when ibuprofin would work fine, or at least well enough, is incompetent, lazy, careless, inept, corrupt, I could go on. Sadly, they have no conscience. What ever happened to “above all, do no harm”? And the doctors who write scripts for the obvious scammers need to be in real jails.
4. The culpability in the state of Florida, with their “pain clinic” pill mills, is astounding. Obviously, lots of Big Pharma money being tossed around in Florida. How scandalous and sad. How do they sleep? If life was fair, it would be their kids getting addicted too. But life isn’t fair.
http://twitter.com/TheCynicalRPh Cynical Pharmacist

I worked in SW Virginia in the years 1999-2001, when the Oxycontin epidemic that killed scores of people began. I’ve seen the amount of pill mill prescription abuse firsthand.

It’s been over 10 years since then and the crisis has worsened.

I don’t have an answer in stopping the problem, but I have noticed that abusers love this drug. As long foolish abusers demand the drug, there will always be unethical and greedy prescribers willing to capitalize on that demand.
Andrew S Milman

The problem isn’t Oxycontin or hydrocodone. The problem is the laws that make the use of these substances illegal. These laws create the criminal class of users. It is foolish to believe that they reduce the availability of painkillers; they just turn the users into criminals.

If we legalized painkillers–and marijuana and heroin–we would save enormous amounts of money by reducing the need for law enforcement and prisons. We’d be much better off if the money were spent on drug education and rehabilitation.

And people who have a genuine need for painkillers would be able to get them.

Most of us wouldn’t abuse painkillers even if they were legal. We need to view the ones who do as a medical problem, not a criminal one.
- Maya9
  
  It is easy to have a libertarian view on drugs until you see used needles lying outside of a building occupied for an afterschool program. I don’t really care if people choose to ruin their own lives, but their behavior effects others.
- LINA
  
  Those drugs that you mention, painkillers, are not illegal, by the way, they are use for other purposes. What is illegal, is to prescribe someone 6/7/8 times the amount needed for pain relief. What is illegal is trafficking on narcotics!
  Diversion is illegal, not the drug!
- Tmcopc
  
  I also agree with Andrew, reducing the availability of medicine that doctors, and labs, hospitals have put billions of dollars of research into to help people in pain,
  what does all that go to waste now too, and all you have are millions of people suffering, and now a complete different mindset with health care professionals who are at risk to prescribe them.
  It’s a horrible problem.
  Tmcopc
Anonymous

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Addictionjournal

http://www.addictionjournal.net
Mmaaaxx

There is no difference in type between these opiates and all other drugs, especially alcohol. The issue of addiction is personal, psychological issue, not a chemical or biological issue. As someone with a good deal of experience with all of these substances, I can safely say that it is a matter of personal understanding, hope etc. not of enforcement or anything like that.

These are lovely substances (opiates) that have been used for thousands of years. If a person has no hope and a melancholic attitude, they will abuse anything from drugs and drink to sex, games, media, and people.
- Tmcopc
  
  I totally agree with Mmaaaxx. I was just thinking on those same lines, especially on the fact that a drug is a drug, and whether this became an epidemic or how, is no longer the issue, and never was. The Dea, and media are certainly blowing everything to a ridiculous preportion, and pointing the fingure in the wrong direction, only to make mass histeria and more opinions, not medical facts.
  Drugs will always be around, it would be nice if with all their scientific facts on rehablitation, for those who cant control themselves, could be used more often.
  Taryn
Marion

A couple of days before this show aired, the headline article in our small town newspaper was about stopping people from flushing prescriptions medications down the toilet because they are getting into the drinking water. Included was a chart from the Federal government listing those medications that were safe to flush: Morphine, oxycontin, delaudid, percodan, percoset, methadone, etc. I assume they are considered safe because their efficacy is lost once they are diluted with water. But I can’t help wondering if it is really safe to do so.
Pingback: Veteran journalists speak from front lines of prescription drug epidemic : Covering Health
http://www.mindmagic123.com Mindmagic123

For those who want more details of the general processes of addiction, and more those specifically regarding medications, I have an article I wrote on my website called “Michael Jackson, Elvis Presley & Anna Nicole Smith: Death is the Prescription, how many more?” It can be viewed on http://www.mindmagic123.com/id120.html Best, hypnohotshot.
Sy2502

Doctors bear much of the blame for this epidemic of addiction. I know so many people addicted to pain killers! Usually they start with a legitimate medical reason, like surgery for example, get addicted, and years later, they continue to pop pills like candy. But why? Because years later, their doctor is still filling their prescription. What responsible doctor continues to fill their prescription for a surgery that happened years ago?
Pingback: Prescription pill problem in Kentucky, elsewhere under microscope on NPR program | Health Wiki information
Marie

It is a mystery why there is not public awareness in the U.S. for this deadly epidemic. There are over 22 million Americans addicted to painkillers! And, that’s only who we know of! Pain killer prescription drugs are 30& of the scripts being written in New York alone. The stats are overwhelming! It’s up to the parents of our young teens and adults to do something about it! When Autism, and Juvenile Diabetes became huge in this country- it was regular, middle class, every day parents to get the Govt involved and do something about it. Which, is a wonderful thing! However, drug abuse is a silent epidemic- where millions are being affected, and dying- yet, nothing is being done as a country. I am involved in a non-profit organization involving teens- sadly, some as young as 12!!!! Something needs to be done to save our children, and their children!!!!!!
Marie

For some who say and suggest Meth as a solution, is certainly not the answer! Especially for young teens and adults. Yes, it is necessary in some cases to be weaned. However, to replace one drug with another is not the way to go about the problem. Does anyone really want their young child or loved one to be put on medication for the rest of their lives? Of course not! There are alternate routes- such as long term in house facilities, treatments centers, etc. More med’s sure as hell isn’t the answer to this deadly epidemic that is taking so many lives. In the U.S. there are 40 deaths- forty, each and every day due to overdose of pain killers. It is the number one killer- that is being ignored.
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Shawnsmom

Doctors are to blame for much of the addiction. I know from experience because my 22 year old son, Shawn died of a heroin overdose 4 weeks ago. It started when he went to the doctor for an injured disk in his back and was prescribed Oxycontin. It’s crazy how it was just as easy for him to walk out of the doctor’s office with Oxycontin as it would have been to walk out with Advil. Shawn quickly became addicted and started going to several doctors at the same time and getting prescriptions filled. When he got caught for stealing the doctors prescription pad and writing his own prescriptions, and only got a slap on the wrist from the Court, Shawn turned to heroin because it’s essentially the same thing as Oxyconton and was easier and cheaper to get. After 6 weeks in rehab, he was home for only 3 days when his brother, my son, Nicky, found him unresponsive on the kitchen floor. It was the day of Nicky’s 24th birthday. So why was Shawn precribed Oxycontin in the first place? Why was it so easy to get from different doctors? Why was he able to fill all these prescriptions at the pharmacy without someone noticing a red flag? All I know is that I lost my beautiful son, Shawn and so many of his friends and other kids his age are all doing the same thing. Something needs to be done.
joezeewee

percription drugs are drugs and poeple become adicted to them. Doctors freely dispense these drugs. Doctors who specialize in mental disordersr are the only ones that should be able to write these scripts. an md doctor is not qualified to dispense these drugs. I e depression aniety stress ect. doctors are only required to heal the body of diseases and if they do the mind will heal too.

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