3 things you should know about how painkillers before you take a prescription of them
There has been a massive increase of doctors over prescribing opioids to patients. Which led to a parallel increase in opioid overdose deaths. Opioids are a very addictive drug and about 80% of people on Heroin abused Opioids before transitioning over to Heroin. There are more safer alternatives to Opioids that have been proven to be just as effective and less addictive. One major alternative medication I will talk about is medical Marijuana. Medical cannabis has proven to be a safe effective tool for chronic pain. It works just as well as opiods and isn’t an addictive or harmful drug. As more and more people have seen that many states have legalised it medically
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PainKillers are being over prescribed
All of the authors from an article called “The Prescription Opioid and Heroin Crisis: A Public Health Approach to and Epidemic of Addiction” saw an unprecedented increase in morbidity and mortality associated with the use of Opioids and wanted to do some research to see what was behind the huge increase of opioid related deaths. Throughout there research they found that many doctors are over prescribing opioids which led to a parallel increase in opioid overdose deaths. Overprescribing of OPRs has led to a sharp increase in the prevalence of opioid addiction, which in turn has been associated with a rise in overdose deaths and heroin use” The authors of this article also found through a survey by Boscarino et al. that the majority of
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opioid plague is proceeding, and medication overdose passings about tripled amid 1999– 2014. Among 47,055 medication overdose passings that happened in 2014 in the United States, 28,647 (60.9%) included an opioid. Illegal opioids are adding to the expansion in opioid overdose passings. With an end goal to target aversion methodologies to address the quickly evolving pandemic, CDC inspected general medication overdose demise rates amid 2010– 2015 and opioid overdose passing rates amid 2014– 2015 by subcategories (normal/semisynthetic opioids, methadone, heroin, and engineered opioids other than methadone).* Rates were stratified by socioeconomics, district, and by 28 states with top notch providing details regarding demise declarations of particular medications engaged with overdose passings. Including 33,091 (63.1%) that included an opioid.With 63% of the overdoses including opioids they saw a increased overdoses on heroin by 20.6%. Through the research that the authors did for an article called “Increases in Drug and Opioid-Involved Overdose Deaths- United States, 2010-2015”. They were able to see with the increase of opioid drugs overdoses there was also a very strong increase in Heroin overdoses. Throughout many of there Sources all of them showed the same a correlation between the two. The Authors were able to come to an conclusion that the increase of heroin users and overdoses is due the increase of Opioid being prescribed. More and more people everyday
The documentary states that over 27,000 deaths a year are due to overdose from heroin and other opioids. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention in 2015 prescription pain relievers account for 20,101 overdose deaths, and 12,990 overdose deaths are related to heroin (Rudd et al., 2010-2015). The documentary’s investigation gives the history of how the heroin epidemic started, with a great focus on the hospice movement. We are presented with the idea that once someone is addicted to painkillers, the difficulty in obtaining the drug over a long period of time becomes too expensive and too difficult. This often leads people to use heroin. This idea is true as a 2014 survey found that 94% of respondents who were being treated for opioid addiction said they chose to use heroin because prescription opioids were “more expensive and harder to obtain (Cicero et al., 2014).” Four in five heroin users actually started out using prescription painkillers (Johns, 2013). This correlation between heroin and prescription painkiller use supports the idea presented in the documentary that “prescription opiates are heroin prep school.”
Almost one hundred years ago, prescription drugs like morphine were available at almost any general store. Women carried bottles of very addictive potent opiate based pain killers in their purse. Many individuals like Edgar Allen Poe died from such addictions. Since that time through various federal, state and local laws, drugs like morphine are now prescription drugs; however, this has not stopped the addiction to opiate based pain killers. Today’s society combats an ever increasing number of very deadly addictive drugs from designer drugs to narcotics to the less potent but equally destructive alcohol and marijuana. With all of these new and old drugs going in and out of vogue with addicts, it appears that the increase of misuse and abuse is founded greater in the prescription opiate based painkillers.
The reason for the increased use of heroin are unclear currently but death rate and emergency room visits for heroin have grown to staggering rates there were 201,000 emergency room visits alone in 2008 and this is only for the lucky few that had friends kind enough to take them to seek help. There are thousands more that worst so lucky and remain unreported. Heroin has become such growing issue that Chattanooga Count has put out a put awareness campaign waring that there has been more death from heroin over dosing then vehicular manslaughter and homicide combine.
Opioid addiction is a tragedy that affects countless of Americans on a daily basis. Almost everyone is acquainted to someone, who suffers from opioid addiction. Everyone, but specifically family and friends of the victims to opioid addiction need to understand why their loved ones are so susceptible to becoming addicted to opioids. The word opioid in itself is complex to define, but it entails a variety of prescription medications. Most opioids are used as pain management medications and qualify as CII medications also known as narcotics. They are supposed to be used on an “as needed” basis, but that is not the case for many users of opioids. Opioids cause great fear in the health community because they are easily addictive and
By the year 2000 opioid medicine containing oxycodone etc., are being abused and misused and more than doubled in 10 years’ time.
Opioid’s chemical composition consist of many highly addictive substances which cause the human body to become quickly tolerant. Many opioid users become addictive to the substance because the doctors have been over prescribing. “In the United States, there were 14,800 annual prescribed opioid (PO) deaths in 2008” with the US having less restrictions (Fischer, Benedikt, et al 178). The United States have implemented more regulations so that “high levels of PO-related harms been associated with highly potent oxycodone formulas” will decrease (Fischer, Benedikt, et al 178). With the regulations, it does not change the fact that opioids are is destructive. The regulations assistance by lessening the probability of patients becoming addictive to opioid. There are numerous generations that are effected and harmed by the detrimental effects of opioids on opioid-dependent patients.
Heroin is one of the most dangerous drugs in the world. When using heroin, people run the risk of developing serious “infectious diseases” such as HIV/AIDS and hepatitis (The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), 2014, para 10). Above all, heroin use often results in death. The DEA Strategic Intelligence Section (2016), who prepared the 2016 National Heroin Threat Assessment Summary claims that heroin is the most fatal drug compared to other drugs because heroin related deaths occur at a much higher rate. In 2014 cocaine users outnumbered heroin users by about three and a half to one, yet there were twice as many heroin related deaths compared to that of cocaine (p. 9). One of the main causes of the large amount of death is a result of what dealers are lacing their heroin with. Fentanyl, a drug that is considered “50” to “100” times stronger than morphine (NIDA, 2016, para 1), is being used by dealers to mix in with their heroin in order to increase its effects and the quantity of their product. Because of how strong fentanyl-laced heroin is, the possibility of overdosing rises, which is the effect that numerous addicts seek out to attain. In the article “Spiked”, written by Maggie Lee (2015), Lieutenant Rick Mason from the Atlanta Police Department emphasizes, “… if somebody OD’s, that’s who [heroin addicts] want to buy their heroin from because it’s the strongest and it must be the best” (para 22). Heroin addicts chase the powerful batches, often asking around for the dealer selling the batch that is causing mass overdoses. Their high tolerance for heroin lead them to believe that they will not fall victim to a deadly overdose until it is too late. When these users consume what they think is their normal dose, the fentanyl kills them. Those unable to receive prescription medication from a doctor will argue that heroin is a cheap way to relieve pain. While heroin may help to
CDC Director Frieden suggests because the epidemic is “doctor-driven”, doctors play an important role and ultimately doctors can reverse it (Ryan and Karlamanga). The image, Opioids, implies doctors are responsible for the opioid overdose epidemic. Prescription opioids, are they a prescription for death that is doctor approved? Prescription opioid drug abuse doesn’t discriminate.
Eighty percent of heroin users say that their opioid use began with the use of opioids. pain relievers. These same individuals say that they have switched to heroin use. because it is less expensive.
One of the reasons the epidemic has become so widespread is due to the addictiveness of opioids. Opioids are prescription medications used to treat pain, with oxycodone and hydrocodone being the more popular drugs (Mayo). Opioids are addictive because of the way
Prescription drugs are making parents more overwhelmed than ever before about their teenaged child! Why must they worry so much about their teenaged child? “When you can stop you don’t want to, and when you want to stop, you can’t…” (Davies). This quote signifies that adolescents and adults have the option to quit or not try the drug when being introduced, but when they get started on the drug and they are thinking abouting quitting, they cannot because of the addiction they have on the drug. Each day they try to stay away from the drug, but they are having really bad withdrawals. Rockingham County Schools should inform parents about the strategies for preventing, recognizing, and addressing prescription drug abuse.
In 2016 Americans are turning to heroin to deal with their despair, pain and turmoil in their lives, subsequently causing an opiate epidemic. This point is further evidenced by the following statement
It doesn’t matter if these patients will become addicted, because these doctors are so sure of it that they overprescribe just so the patients won’t come back asking for more in the near future. Due to the inconsideration and selfishness of these doctors “Prescription drug abuse is the fastest growing form of substance abuse”(Hanson). To make matters worse, a majority of these doctors aren't even warning their patients about the type of drug they are dealing with. According to the National Institute on drug abuse, opioids are a class of drugs that include the illegal drug heroin, causing them to be highly addictive(Thomas et al). Not only is it clear to see that these doctors are at fault here for even prescribing a drug they know can be as addicting as heroin, but also because they aren't doing anything to fix their mistakes, much less admit that they are at fault here. Doctors are to blame for these addiction, not the patients. Doctors are also to blame for not giving these unhealthy addictions the attention they deserve. After all, they are required by the FDA to give risk evaluations when the risks of the drug outweigh the benefits(Blake). Yet on the contrary to popular belief these doctors aren’t giving those evaluations out, if they were more deaths could
Another way to tell that the use of heroin is on the rise is by the number of emergency room visits that deal with heroin users. In 1990 there was 33,000 emergency department visits nationally where heroin use was involved. By the year 1995 the number had more than doubled to 76,000. In the mid-1980's about ten percent of patient population was identified as being IV drug users. Now, the number is up to about twenty percent. (Source # 4, Gabor Kelen, Professor of Emergency Medicine in the School of Medicine and director of Hopkins Emergency room).
The rate of death due to prescription drug abuse in the U.S. has escalated 313 percent over the past decade. According to the Congressional Quarterly Transcription’s article "Rep. Joe Pitt Holds a Hearing on Prescription Drug Abuse," opioid prescription drugs were involved in 16,650 overdose-caused deaths in 2010, accounting for more deaths than from overdoses of heroin and cocaine. Prescribed drugs or painkillers sometimes "condemn a patient to lifelong addiction," according to Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This problem not only affects the lives of those who overdose but it affects the communities as well due to the convenience of being able to find these items in drug stores and such. Not to mention the fact that the doctors who prescribe these opioids often tend to misuse them as well. Abusing these prescribed drugs can “destroy dreams and abort great destinies," and end the possibility of the abuser to have a positive impact in the community.