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OxyContin's 12-hour problem (2016)

latimes.com

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Re: OxyContin's 12-hour problem (2016)

#71

Post by Spivak »

mhb wrote: post #59
Spivak wrote: post #19

I'm sure this is an easy question to answer, but it was bugging me during the whole article. What's preventing a pill that releases a dose immediately and one after 6 hours? Or something like a diabetic pump that dispenses medication continuously? Surely such systems have the potential to be safer and more effective for patients?

Why would it need an automatic pill? What about 1/n dosage taken n times per day? Less convenient sure, but you can pick whatever n works.

Less about convenience, more about letting patients get a full night's sleep. Maybe the answer is to alter the sleep schedule of chronic pain sufferers, but it would probably require some form accommodation at the workplace.

Re: OxyContin's 12-hour problem (2016)

#72

Post by panzer_wyrm »

yborg wrote: post #27
panzer_wyrm wrote: post #7

Can somebody give some context on the root cause of the problem - the chronic pain epidemic in US. What caused it, why it is more than in other parts of the world and why so many painkillers? Is it cultural?

Read the article. It's economic - the makers of these opiate drugs have large marketing budgets they employ to encourage physicians to prescribe these addictive drugs and there has been essentially no governmental oversight on these marketing efforts because these marketing budgets also fund lobbying activities. There have been a few prosecutions of individual sales/marketing people for knowingly supplying pill mills…

Yeah but the problem goes deeper. Not sure how to properly describe it. The initial sentence people waking up to take painkillers is unbelievably weird. If you manage to fell asleep - then the pain itself is unlikely to wake you up.

What the farma company did was exploit already existing predisposition of people to take painkillers. They were working on fertile ground.

I don't know - having large population of people that need constant painkillers in their day to day life is just strange. Abusing the people is despicable. But why did this population existed in the first place?

Re: OxyContin's 12-hour problem (2016)

#73

Post by [deleted] »

pfortuny wrote: post #36
gragas wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>What caused it, why it is more than in other parts of the world and why so many painkillers? >Is it cultural? That's actually a really common misconception on HN. The United States ranks 27th among countries which abuse opiates, [1] behind many first-world countries like the UK, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, Ireland, and Russia, to name a few. What's the cause? A lot of HNers like to pin it on unemployment and low-wage…

That table is for opiate use , which needs not be (at all) ab-use. Your argument does not stand on that data.

[deleted]

Re: OxyContin's 12-hour problem (2016)

#74

Post by tommynicholas »

mhb wrote: post #51
tommynicholas wrote: post #41

I just got ACL surgery and am doing the entire recovery (day 11) without any painkillers stronger than ibuprofin. This is not because I'm so brave, but because I know the pain associated with opioids to be so much than the physical pain in my knee. We've got to aggressively pursue alternatives.

Or maybe your pain is not as severe as the pain for which others take opioids.

That is almost certainly true. ACL surgery pain is intense and taking prescription painkillers is strongly recommended, but certainly, there are more intense pains people experience. I don't really think that's relevant to my point but perhaps it is.

Re: OxyContin's 12-hour problem (2016)

#75

Post by [deleted] »

stordoff wrote: post #61
gragas wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>What caused it, why it is more than in other parts of the world and why so many painkillers? >Is it cultural? That's actually a really common misconception on HN. The United States ranks 27th among countries which abuse opiates, [1] behind many first-world countries like the UK, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, Ireland, and Russia, to name a few. What's the cause? A lot of HNers like to pin it on unemployment and low-wage…

Those data for opiate use, not abuse. I suspect the percentage of the population who have used any opiates at least once in the past year tells you very little about about opiate-related problems - using cocodamol once a year is obviously very different to the habitual use of oxycodone. I further suspect that the availability of opiate-containing drugs over the counter in some countries accounts for some of the diffe…

[deleted]

Re: OxyContin's 12-hour problem (2016)

#76

Post by Alex3917 »

dismantlethesun wrote: post #63
Alex3917 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> at a societal level we substantially blame addiction on "drug abuse" which is not always an adequate model. While I agree that this model is not accurate, I'd also point out that just because you're taking a drug as directed doesn't mean you're not abusing it. For whatever reason most people in the U.S. seem to have a wildly unjustifiable level of faith in western medicine, either way too much or way too little. Be…

What do you characterize as drug abuse?

> What do you characterize as drug abuse?

I tend to think about drug misuse, rather than drug abuse, since not taking certain drugs can be just as irrational and damaging as taking too many drugs.

But basically I think people should use drugs as tools to maximize their utility based on their needs and values. And I think that drug misuse is anything that leads to significantly suboptimal utility that's clearly not justifiable by any sort of internally coherent reasoning.

Re: OxyContin's 12-hour problem (2016)

#77

Post by heywire »

racl101 wrote: post #25

I hope I never have to take this stuff. Watching how dependent my mom has become on this has been painful to watch.

I feel the same way. I watched my dad go from Vicodin to Oxy to dead by age 50. All for a neck injury + surgery. It is a painful thing to watch the man who taught you everything reduced to crying on the floor because his prescription ran out early and it would a couple days until it could be refilled.

Re: OxyContin's 12-hour problem (2016)

#78

Post by sergior »

stronglikedan wrote: post #31
racl101 wrote: post #25

I hope I never have to take this stuff. Watching how dependent my mom has become on this has been painful to watch.

Search "kratom" (Mitragyna speciosa). It helps people kick their opiate addiction every day. It's not a magic bullet by any means, but it helps by mitigating the withdrawals to a tolerable point. Good luck - I know how you feel.

I think it is worth mentioning that it actually kills pain and I am yet to experience any side effects. Only problem is to find the right dose, but it is a minor obstacle in comparison to the hell offered by pharmaceuticals. I have been taking Kratom for a month now and after a week dropped all pain medication prescribed by doctor. I feel like I am getting my life back. I feel that there are forces out there trying to make it illegal, because it interferes with the profits of pharmaceutical companies.

Re: OxyContin's 12-hour problem (2016)

#79

Post by hammock »

wayn3 wrote: post #20
panzer_wyrm wrote: post #7

Can somebody give some context on the root cause of the problem - the chronic pain epidemic in US. What caused it, why it is more than in other parts of the world and why so many painkillers? Is it cultural?

People take painkillers because they can't afford surgery. Say you have a messed up disk in your spine. Surgery is tens of thousands of dollars. Getting a prescription for opioids from a primary care physician is a bit cheaper. You don't see doctors in europe routinely prescribing hard pain killers because they try to fix the problem instead. Healthcare in america is set up in such a way that hospitals just bill what…

People also take painkillers to recover from surgery...That is how many folks get hooked, and in some cases, eventually switch to heroin (because they can't afford the pills off-script at black market prices)

Re: OxyContin's 12-hour problem (2016)

#80

Post by siliconc0w »

This is a dupe but Pursue should be prosecuted and held accountable for the total fucking disaster Oxycontin has wrought on our country. They should be considered enemies of the state. This shit is worse than any drug lord in Mexico or any ISIS leader as far as impact to US citizens and they knowingly perpetrated it.
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