Newspaper article worth reading, it involves you, since you have chronic pain!
Wow, Sheila!
Everyone should read this. It is also happening in the states, I believe.
Doctor's don't like to deal with what they don't understand, I find, most of the time.
This is such a sad and inhumane state of affairs.
Thank you for posting.
Stef
I just got a kind notice that this discussion is being featured, but when I go to featured discussions, it's not there.
I can add more notes to this now. Today a friend sent me a lab sheet from the USA. I compared it to my own, and there were only about 1/3 as many tests available on mine to diagnose illness, as was on the USA sheet. I don't know if the difference is that this person is in a big city, or a University hospital, and that maybe I would get that many tests available at a bigger place in Canada, of if we are really being fooled in Canada when they take a number of tests, then tell us its all in our heads or due to stress or whatever because they do not even have the amount of tests to test for various illnesses, like I saw on the US lab tests form. I also have lupus and other issues so I will post this in those groups as well, but I am sure going to do some investigating and reporting!
Sheila
Thanks Stef;
I have a book called "How Doctors Think" by a Dr. who got very ill and was amazed at how HE was treated, and started thinking about why they all acted the same, and discovered what all medical students are taught. It's quite interesting, and helped me reword my comments so they would understand me better and help me more. It said that doctors don't like to deal with chronic illness, because it's a blow to their ego if they can't cure you, and they almost cringe to see you coming. I have only had very mean rheumatologists and neurologists, so now I wonder if that's why they were so impatient and unkind with me.
Stef said:
Wow, Sheila!
Everyone should read this. It is also happening in the states, I believe.
Doctor's don't like to deal with what they don't understand, I find, most of the time.
This is such a sad and inhumane state of affairs.
Thank you for posting.
Stef
I just read the News paper article posted by Sheila. That is exactly what is happening to me right now. A prominent pain mgmt doctor in my area lost her license for over prescribing thus all the doctors are running scared. I have had ATypical Post Herpetic Neuralgia for 10 years and my pain medication over that time has increased due to tolerance. Now my pain mgmt doc has brought up something I have never heard of Hyperalgesia. From what I can tell it is when your Opiate pain medications causes more pain then what you are really in. It is something completely new to me but I thought for all of you TN patients utilizing Opiate therapy this might come up in your treatment so I thought I would share it with you. You can google it and get all the info you need. I suggest you google Opiate induced Hyperalgesia.
Just and FYI........
laurie
Thanks for this info Laurie. i have experienced Hyperalgesia. I seem to sometimes have a little more pain when I use my breakthrough med oxycodone. I asked my doctor about it long ago as I had noticed that maybe the med was affecting my pain and he directed me to read about it. This still happens every once in a while and mostly on really terrible pain days when I take more than one. I'm on a really low dosage pill and don't take them all that often so that's why I probably experience Hyperalgesia.
I was also told by my doc that Hyperalgesia is caused by the brain recognizing that when pain occurs that it receives pain medication to block it. So, when taking a pain med it triggers a pain response as the brain is trained to think that we are in pain? correct me if I am wrong on the definition.
Thanks again. Johanna
However, MS contin, my maintenance pain med has never affected me in this regard.
Laurie Barnes Keil said:
I just read the News paper article posted by Sheila. That is exactly what is happening to me right now. A prominent pain mgmt doctor in my area lost her license for over prescribing thus all the doctors are running scared. I have had ATypical Post Herpetic Neuralgia for 10 years and my pain medication over that time has increased due to tolerance. Now my pain mgmt doc has brought up something I have never heard of Hyperalgesia. From what I can tell it is when your Opiate pain medications causes more pain then what you are really in. It is something completely new to me but I thought for all of you TN patients utilizing Opiate therapy this might come up in your treatment so I thought I would share it with you. You can google it and get all the info you need. I suggest you google Opiate induced Hyperalgesia.
Just and FYI........
laurie
Hyperalgesia–I have realized my limits with my meds too. I found that when I take over a certain dosage, it seems to shut down all of my own pain killing endorphins in my brain, and then I REALLY hurt, because the medicine isn’t a good substitute for those, so I have to take under a certain dosage so that my brain will still kick in some of my own painkillers.
Yes, I've learned one must be careful.
Because of this, sometimes, less is more.
However, I would never negate that opiates are the only reason why I am a functional person, at this point.
My long lasting opiate does me far more good than my break through pain med.
Interesting observation! I intend to read more on the subject. Thank you for bringing it up, Laurie, and for further clarification, Sheila.
Yes, this is some sort of glitch, Sheila. Whenever I "Feature" discussions, they only show up as Featured for a short period of time. The "editing" screens do not allow me to correct this. I intend to write Scott Orn about it, when I get around to it, to ask him if there is a way that this can be fixed in the sub-groups.
I do like that when I "Feature" a discussion, that it seems to remain at the top of the discussions, instead of getting lost on the sub-group discussion board.