I know that I've seen a lot of doctors here that refuse absolutely to give any kind of real pain relief. I know others have expressed the same kinds of problems.
I found these documents on the Arizona Medical Board web site and they give a very good definition and case for the use of pain meds and what the difference is between need and addiction. It's a good thing to know if you are having struggles with this kind of thing.
You should check with your own state medical board and see what their rules are. Because of the inconsistencies between states, federal guidelines have been put in place and that are very good. I also found out that insufficient pain management is reason to report a doctor to the medical board. So is not keeping good medical records. Interesting.
Here's the links:
http://www.fsmb.org/pdf/2004_grpol_controlled_substances.pdf
http://www.azmd.gov/pain_management/Guidelines.pdf
Then there are folks like you and me Deanna that they are dying to give morphine toI'm going to show Julie these as she gets blasted all the time by everyone about being on pain meds.
unfortunatly we have the addicts to thank for this...I know first hand how easy it is to become jaded in the ER setting...but I did find that in the past year I have seen the docs being a little more cautious about NOT giving it..they are starting to learn that not everyone is a drug seeker.
one thing that may work in our favor is that the Vicodin addiction seems to be slowing down..these people are maxing out on the 10 mg pills and they have no where to go from there...alot of them are turning back to street drugs...YAY..let them all go get addicted to meth instead so we will have our rights back..
He was my first and so far my only RD. He was aggressive in my treatment from the beginning. Unfortunately, I became allergic to just about anything that worked after a period of time. I am getting ready for my 2nd round of Rituxan, so far, no allergies. I hope this one works, because there are not many options left for me. My daughter attempt to deal with pain has been horrendous. Because of her age, she definitely gets discriminated against. The worst people are her mental health care providers. They always are making accusations of abuse. The ideal situation is for her psychiatrist to work with her medical doctor and pain specialist to make sure all the meds are balanced. But they refuse to do this. It really puts her in not only a bad situation, but sometimes a dangerous one. The one thing we can control is that we found one hospital that will treat her with respect and caution. We only take her to this one ER. That way it makes it very hard for them to accuse her of over medicating and if she is, then they have to notify her doctors. It puts the responsibility back on them to help her manage her care because sometimes she does mess up. It's not delibrate, it's part of her illnesses. The other hospital that is close to her always treats young patients as though they are drug abusers. They are absolutely cruel in their treatment. Really, it borders on being abusive. The good one, takes everything into consideration, won't give out medications unduly. But they never treat her like she is a piece of garbage.
each and every patient must be charted every four hours. I personally hate
this tool as some of my patients tell me their pain is a 22 out of 10 and
makes it very difficult to assess the true situation. I'm with crunchy.
Doctors are very hesitant to give out meds because there has been so much
abuse of the meds...and the system. I have gone to the ER on several
occasions...to the hopital where I work...and I have been made to feel like a
drug seeker and it makes me so mad. There is a small group out there (a
growing number though) that have ruined it for many of us that really need
the meds to be able to function normally. I am glad the laws have
addressed this issue though. But I observe this at the bedside every day and
it is the very hardest part of the assessment because we are constantly
balancing pain control and making sure the patient continues to breathe.
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