Investigation: Chronic pain patients denied life-saving medicine because of opioid crackdown
Medical experts said the government crackdown on opioids has had a chilling effect — causing doctors, pharmacists and insurance companies to severely …
they also asked patients to sign that paper to the cdc & I was one of them. The insurance companies are causing a problem as well, many are also refusing to cover the meds just on the basis that the med is an opiate. it's a total war on chronic pain, the CDC was unrealistic & the DEA are absolutely insane to do this to those of us in chronic daily pain.
Every night I pray that they end up in pain like me so they can get a good dose of their own bullshit
We are not a country of MORALS!! We’re a country of money, more government and more more government. No one is going to listen because no one cares. Hollow points never miss! Consider it to have been a good fight.
This is madness and we need to stand up for cpp!!
Doctors would rather you die than write a prescription for pain killers. I almost died of heart failure at 35 because my body simply couldn’t take the extreme stress the chronic pain was causing.
WE WHOM SUFFER SHOULD NEVER EVER HAVE ANY GOVERNMENT MAKING DECISIONS F OK R A TRUE SUFFERER . COME TO MY HOUSE YOU WOULD WANT TO RUN ITS A NIGHTMARE YOU ARE NOT DOING ME A FAVOR YOU NEED TO KNOW WHAT YOU DONE I HOPE THE FAMILIES THAT HAVE HAD SUICIDE IN THE HOME BECAUSE OF A GOVERNMENT IDIOT'S TAKING OUR RIGHTS TAKE THEM TO COURT SUING THE ONES THAT KILLED MY FAMILY OVER A DECISION FROM SOME OEOPLE TGAT NEVER HAD TRUE LASTING PAIN SHOULD SHUT UP
When is this going to end? I was abandoned and cut off my opioid medication 6 months ago. I don't know how long I can wait for action to help us.
Thank you so much for being willing to talk about this extremely under reported problem.
Many severe CPP (Chronic Pain Patients) have tried other therapies and other medications and for many, prescription pain meds arw the only thing that allows them enough relief to keep living and have some quality of life. Many ins companies don't cover 'alternative' therapies and for patients that are still able to work, employers tire quickly of giving time patients time off and they then suffer further financial hardships because of lost hours at work.
According to the CDC, 250,000 people die every year from medical mistakes, 450,000 die from tobacco related issues…where is the "crisis" for these?
The rate of addiction has stayed almost the same across decades, hovering around 2-5%, yet all of a sudden pain meds are causing it?
Even hospice patients are having trouble getting pain meds now.
I don't disagree there are too many overdoses, this is a huge problem, but the vast majority are due to illicit fentanyl and that can also be found in counterfeit pills, made by drug dealers, that look exactly like the real ones.
The VA has patients killng themselves in their parking lots and one recently did it inside the VA medical facility itself.
The DEA needs to be reined in and stopped from terrorizing the few doctors left, that are willing to write pain meds and not allowed to profile prescribers, or patients, using PDMPs.
Main stream media needs to stop parroting the misinformation from the anti-opiate zealots and look further into the amount of suicides because of CPP being forced to quit their pain medications and/or involuntarily & inappropriately tapered.
Even the CDC admitted their initial reported death rates from pain meds was misrepresented and the number of people who died from pain meds alone was drastically reduced, although still high necaise of the way death certificates are filled out.
A person could be a passenger in a car, on the way home from surgery, get in an accident and die and their death will still be reported as "opioid related".
The difference between "dependence" and "addiction" needs to be discussed as well. To explain this very simply: The lives of CPP who use opiates are improved, while the lives of those addicted become worse.
I am sincerely sorry for anyone whose lost a loved one due to substance abuse issues, but the data shows that the majority of people who became addicted to pain meds, already had aspects of addictive behavior beforehand.
Please don't cause more deaths, and the suffering of hundreds of thousands of CPP, because of these other tragedies.
WTAE Pittsburgh did an excellent job on this story and the more we can get the truth out, the more lives will be saved. However, I'd like to point out that the original CDC guidelines specifically states that it's not to be applied to chronic, cancer, elderly, palliative and hospice care patients. Also, while medical marijuana can be helpful to many pain patients, it can also cause an increase in pain, not be strong enough (as mentioned by the CPP in this story, and can make it very jard to function while beimg 'high' all day.
People that have only used pain meds temporarily for post-op pain or illegally often feel a euphoria or unclear thinking, but when taken long term, CPPs bodies become tolerant to this side effect and don't feel like that at all. All they feel is pain relief.
Another big "Thank You!" goes out to Dr. Ryan Marino, and all the other physicians, who signed the letter.
Dr. Marino is 100% correct, imo, that there is "…no middle ground…".
We need a balanced approach, as well as more financially viable options to other therapis and treatments, that can be used in conjunction with pain meds, whenever feasible and/or appropriate.
Opiates, when used responsibly, are on of the safest pain medications available and don't harm the patient's organs or GI tracts like Tylenol or ibuprofen do.
At least 98% of people are going to need opiates at some point in their lives, if only because if old age.
They need to be kept available and more research done.
The torture of pain patients needs to stop.
agreed. Even worse, you have more medical bills yet you cannot afford them because you can't work, or work even a part time job. If I had more medicine I could contribute to society more and yet I'm in horrible pain no one can imagine through no fault of my own.
I'm tired of suffering without my pain meds because of a heroin epidemic in the US that has nothing to do with me. It's like being punished for something I never did wrong. What's next, shut down the entire freeway system because there is a drunk driver out on the road somewhere..? Even criminals get a fair trial before they are sentenced to suffer.
God Bless you! For telling the Truth of this matter!
they also asked patients to sign that paper to the cdc & I was one of them. The insurance companies are causing a problem as well, many are also refusing to cover the meds just on the basis that the med is an opiate. it's a total war on chronic pain, the CDC was unrealistic & the DEA are absolutely insane to do this to those of us in chronic daily pain.
Every night I pray that they end up in pain like me so they can get a good dose of their own bullshit
We are not a country of MORALS!! We’re a country of money, more government and more more government. No one is going to listen because no one cares. Hollow points never miss! Consider it to have been a good fight.
This is madness and we need to stand up for cpp!!
Doctors would rather you die than write a prescription for pain killers. I almost died of heart failure at 35 because my body simply couldn’t take the extreme stress the chronic pain was causing.
WE WHOM SUFFER SHOULD NEVER EVER HAVE ANY GOVERNMENT MAKING DECISIONS F OK R A TRUE SUFFERER . COME TO MY HOUSE YOU WOULD WANT TO RUN
ITS A NIGHTMARE
YOU ARE NOT DOING ME A FAVOR YOU NEED TO KNOW WHAT YOU DONE I HOPE THE FAMILIES THAT HAVE HAD SUICIDE IN THE HOME BECAUSE OF A GOVERNMENT IDIOT'S TAKING OUR RIGHTS TAKE THEM TO COURT SUING THE ONES THAT KILLED MY FAMILY OVER A DECISION FROM SOME OEOPLE TGAT NEVER HAD TRUE LASTING PAIN
SHOULD SHUT UP
When is this going to end? I was abandoned and cut off my opioid medication 6 months ago. I don't know how long I can wait for action to help us.
Great reporting
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/a-remote-virginia-valley-has-been-flooded-by-prescription-opioids/2019/07/18/387bb074-a8ca-11e9-9214-246e594de5d5_story.html?utm_term=.c0ab90741ffd#
2007-2012 Where was the DEA when people where allegedly dying?
MONSTER PAIN GROWING IN ME NOT ENOUGH MEDS
Thank you so much for being willing to talk about this extremely under reported problem.
Many severe CPP (Chronic Pain Patients) have tried other therapies and other medications and for many, prescription pain meds arw the only thing that allows them enough relief to keep living and have some quality of life.
Many ins companies don't cover 'alternative' therapies and for patients that are still able to work, employers tire quickly of giving time patients time off and they then suffer further financial hardships because of lost hours at work.
According to the CDC, 250,000 people die every year from medical mistakes, 450,000 die from tobacco related issues…where is the "crisis" for these?
The rate of addiction has stayed almost the same across decades, hovering around 2-5%, yet all of a sudden pain meds are causing it?
Even hospice patients are having trouble getting pain meds now.
I don't disagree there are too many overdoses, this is a huge problem, but the vast majority are due to illicit fentanyl and that can also be found in counterfeit pills, made by drug dealers, that look exactly like the real ones.
The VA has patients killng themselves in their parking lots and one recently did it inside the VA medical facility itself.
The DEA needs to be reined in and stopped from terrorizing the few doctors left, that are willing to write pain meds and not allowed to profile prescribers, or patients, using PDMPs.
Main stream media needs to stop parroting the misinformation from the anti-opiate zealots and look further into the amount of suicides because of CPP being forced to quit their pain medications and/or involuntarily & inappropriately tapered.
Even the CDC admitted their initial reported death rates from pain meds was misrepresented and the number of people who died from pain meds alone was drastically reduced, although still high necaise of the way death certificates are filled out.
A person could be a passenger in a car, on the way home from surgery, get in an accident and die and their death will still be reported as "opioid related".
The difference between "dependence" and "addiction" needs to be discussed as well.
To explain this very simply:
The lives of CPP who use opiates are improved, while the lives of those addicted become worse.
I am sincerely sorry for anyone whose lost a loved one due to substance abuse issues, but the data shows that the majority of people who became addicted to pain meds, already had aspects of addictive behavior beforehand.
Please don't cause more deaths, and the suffering of hundreds of thousands of CPP, because of these other tragedies.
WTAE Pittsburgh did an excellent job on this story and the more we can get the truth out, the more lives will be saved.
However, I'd like to point out that the original CDC guidelines specifically states that it's not to be applied to chronic, cancer, elderly, palliative and hospice care patients.
Also, while medical marijuana can be helpful to many pain patients, it can also cause an increase in pain, not be strong enough (as mentioned by the CPP in this story, and can make it very jard to function while beimg 'high' all day.
People that have only used pain meds temporarily for post-op pain or illegally often feel a euphoria or unclear thinking, but when taken long term, CPPs bodies become tolerant to this side effect and don't feel like that at all.
All they feel is pain relief.
Another big "Thank You!" goes out to Dr. Ryan Marino, and all the other physicians, who signed the letter.
Dr. Marino is 100% correct, imo, that there is "…no middle ground…".
We need a balanced approach, as well as more financially viable options to other therapis and treatments, that can be used in conjunction with pain meds, whenever feasible and/or appropriate.
Opiates, when used responsibly, are on of the safest pain medications available and don't harm the patient's organs or GI tracts like Tylenol or ibuprofen do.
At least 98% of people are going to need opiates at some point in their lives, if only because if old age.
They need to be kept available and more research done.
The torture of pain patients needs to stop.
agreed. Even worse, you have more medical bills yet you cannot afford them because you can't work, or work even a part time job. If I had more medicine I could contribute to society more and yet I'm in horrible pain no one can imagine through no fault of my own.
I'm tired of suffering without my pain meds because of a heroin epidemic in the US that has nothing to do with me. It's like being punished for something I never did wrong. What's next, shut down the entire freeway system because there is a drunk driver out on the road somewhere..? Even criminals get a fair trial before they are sentenced to suffer.
God Bless you! For telling the Truth of this matter!
And at 2:21
COME
TO PAPA
Miss use , is the problem … trust your doctors don’t your patients!!!!!