181–190 of 376 posts
Really the duration can vary quite a lot. I was put under on fentanyl for having my wisdom teeth taken out and woke up in the middle of the operation in extreme pain as someone was digging my teeth out with a metal instrument. I moaned at him, through a mouth stuffed with gauze pads, to get the fuck off me and let me out of there if he wasn't giving me more meds. He proceeded to angrily accuse me of taking dope, whic…
For example codamol is now not prescribed in a hospital setting for under 5s, after one child died because they had large amounts of the enzyme required to processes it all at once. This caused respiratory arrest.
the BNF has prices: https://www.evidence.nhs.uk/formulary/bnf/current/4-central-...
and some basic advice: https://www.evidence.nhs.uk/formulary/bnf/current/4-central-...
also a big fat warning saying its a fucking opiate. If a doctor is surprised that a synthetic slow release diamorphene derivative has variable outcomes, is deeply upsetting. Its their fucking job to monitor the outcome of drugs. Its pretty much half of being a doctor.
One of the many advantages of the NHS is the chances of getting hooked on painkillers if miniscule, mainly because drugs are prescribed for the purpose of helping you, not because you've seen an advert, or you want to make a bit more money.
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People are weak. But boy, they can sure click a little triangle. The world is safe now.
Please stop posting uncivil and unsubstantive comments to Hacker News. We're looking for thoughtful discussion here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html
Ball's in your court.
I haven't taken OxyContin but withdrawal symptoms and the concept of hell are interesting (well, afterwards at least). It's like the mind has a thought, then checks to see how the body reacts (i.e. with joy or fear) and this in turn affects how the thought is interpreted, which then influences what is the next thought, etc. The oxycontin or whatever temporarily cuts off this mind-body connection (without paralysis!)…
It's a little strange to be speaking about the anecdotal experience of OxyContin without having that experience. Is this how it was explained to you from a friend?
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Hydrocodone is relatively cheap and anecdotally quite effective. When I broke my ribs, I was told to take both Hydrocodone/paracetamol (Norco) and ibuprofen every day. However, I knew my doctor was trying to get me hooked on it. So I spaced it out, I'd do one day Norco, then the next day ibuprofen, and I didn't really develop much of a tolerance. I did notice, however, when I had some shoulder pain the other day from…
Ibuprofen is often prescribed (or just recommended) for its anti-inflammatory effects. (opiates and paracetamol do not have those effects)
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I don't get this mentality at all. I would guess a majority of adults in the US have had Vicodin or similar and I don't know anyone personally who ever got addicted. In some it causes nausea. You don't like it, fine. But I don't understand how people can be so pro marijuana on one hand, and so anti-opiates on the other. It's pain. It's not noble to suffer needlessly. It's complete BS that it's harder for a dentist to…
> But I don't understand how people can be so pro marijuana on one hand, and so anti-opiates on the other. It's probably the hundreds of thousands of dead people from opiate overdoses vs the 0 dead people from marijuana overdose. > I would guess a majority of adults in the US have had Vicodin or similar and I don't know anyone personally who ever got addicted. You almost certainly know someone who has been addicted,…
Like I said, feels very hyperbolic.
It's like you're suggesting marijuana has no negative downsides at all when millions of people risk their freedom on a routine basis to consume it. Physical/physiological, doesn't make much difference when you're sitting in a cell and your family's financial future is in jeopardy. And I do know some people like that. It is shockingly common.
I don't think drug users in general should be in jail. Even if I think in general people would be better off without them outside of a medical reason.
When you start restricting people's freedom because you think you know what's best for them, and inflict needless suffering in the process, I have a hard time telling you apart from any other prohibitionist.
There is a difference between marketing and actual use. Its a synthetic opioid, which means it has all the variability of opioids. Any decent doctor should know this, and the guides, if they were any good will indicate it. For example codamol is now not prescribed in a hospital setting for under 5s, after one child died because they had large amounts of the enzyme required to processes it all at once. This caused res…
There is a difference between marketing and actual use. Its a synthetic opioid, which means it has all the variability of opioids. Any decent doctor should know this, and the guides, if they were any good will indicate it. For example codamol is now not prescribed in a hospital setting for under 5s, after one child died because they had large amounts of the enzyme required to processes it all at once. This caused res…
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>>and that Merck has discovered that it's a new stream of profits by convincing doctors that everyone should take vaccines for low-risk diseases. Depends on what you mean by "low-risk disease." If you mean diseases that are rarely seen, then I think you need to re-examine your stance. The reason a lot of those diseases are low-risk is because the population has herd-immunity from decades of vaccination. This is a goo…
I mean things like HPV vaccination. I'm not going to get my son vaccinated. This is an example of Merck and the other drug manufacturers manufacturing a vaccine to treat a low-risk disease. Pushing it on boys, as well, is simply expanding the market to get more money. When my daughter is old enough, she can get the vaccine, once we have figured out if there are long-term effects from this vaccine of if it's just scar…
Another problem is all the anti abuse so called safeguards like timed release so the pills can't be crushed. That means you can't take half the pill and a few hours later the other half which is what some people did to get around the false 12hr relief advertising before the DEA and other government meddlers got involved. As for the FDA guy materializing at Perdue this is par for the course of all gov positions. A cab…
> That means you can't take half the pill and a few hours later the other half which is what some people did to get around the false 12hr relief advertising before the DEA and other government meddlers got involved. can you elaborate on this? I'm not sure how the mechanism works to prevent splitting the pill in two. (I'm not sure how the mechanism works at all, really.) I found this article: http://www.popsci.com/sci…
The "abuse-resistant" tablets are made by mixing the active ingredients with a polymer, a plastic- or glue-like substance that, when dried, is very hard and slightly malleable. Typically, attempts to crush these tablets simply flatten them out rather than pulverize them. They can still be cut in half, but doing so is more difficult and dangerous than with a standard tablet (you need a very sharp knife/razor to cut them, and you need considerably more effort as well, which increases the risk of injuring yourself while attempting the cut).
Patients who wish to pulverize these pills can still do so using a Dremel or similar power tool, but direct insufflation tends to result in gunking up their nostrils: when the powder mixes with mucous, it turns into a thick goo that clogs the nasal passages. This can be circumvented by cutting the powder with the powder of a crushed over-the-counter medication (typically acetaminophen/paracetamol). At a ≥50% paracetamol ratio, the resulting mucous goo can be avoided entirely.
Patients who wish to inject the substance will also run into the goo problem when trying to dissolve the powder in water or other liquid. The goo is too thick to inject with a typical syringe. I'm almost 100% certain there's a way around this as with insufflation, but I'm not sure what such a method would be. I guarantee you that users who inject already know.
It seems to me that pharmaceutical companies are constantly being surprised by the lengths to which drug addicts will go to get their fix. The only effective way to "combat" drug abuse would be to decriminalize possession and (ab)use of these substances (in the sense that perpetrators will not be regarded as criminals), to start viewing users as sufferers of an illness / mental health problem rather than as criminals, and to make treatment for their addictions readily available without stigma. Slapping addicts with a felony and sending them to prison is the current practice, and it is absolutely ineffective at combating drug abuse. In terms of government funding, I seriously doubt that treatment for addiction will be any more expensive than imprisonment, and it may even be cheaper. Of course, medical providers can do their part by prescribing such addictive substances only as a last resort, and only at the smallest effective dosage.