We Feel Too Much Pain

By Author: Thomas Strickland
Total Articles: 102
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Here's a question for you. Before painkillers became so freely available and the price fell, what did people do? Did they roll around on the ground all the time, moaning that the pain was just too much? Or did they do their best to get on with life? Well, the whole point of movements like Christian Science was that, through prayer, you can promote physical healing. Indeed, the commonly held belief was that falling ill was a result of sin so, by repenting and healing the sin, you could also heal the body. In a culture where medical science was in its infancy, deciding to avoid drugs was an entirely rational decision since so many of them were actually or potentially dangerous and/or addictive. Today, we have a curious reversal. Despite the fact we are probably the most religious country on the planet, we now devalue prayer in favor of drugs. This is a remarkable victory for the marketers whose job it is to promote the pharmaceutical industry. The question remains how many people feel too much pain and therefore feel obliged to take strong painkillers. The answer has recently been supplied by researchers at BostonUniversity.

They ...
... undertook a random telephone survey of some 19,000 adults. This is a statistically significant number of people and it's reasonably safe to generalize from this sample to the population of the US. Allowing for some of those answering the questions with less than perfect honesty, it seems that slightly more than 4 million take a strong opioid painkiller on a regular basis. Adding in the national count of prescriptions issued, we can say with some confidence that about 10 million are likely to take a strong painkiller in any given week. For this to make any medical sense, a vast number of people must believe they are suffering moderate to severe pain. Except the more likely explanation is that people have convinced themselves that strong drugs are like aspirin. The argument usually runs along the lines that the FDA have declared the drugs safe so, even if using this drug is an overreaction, it's nevertheless safe. This is a bad way of justifying abuse. Worse, the use of the official prescription count to give credibility to the numbers is an underestimate. With the common use of online pharmacies, millions of people now buy their painkillers without a prescription.

In the survey people were asked to list the diseases and disorders they treated with drugs like Tramadol HCL. Most suggested headaches, back pain, and so on. About 5% admitted using painkillers for anxiety and depressive disorders. Alternatively, about 30% took painkillers and antidepressants together. The definition of pain is getting more flexible. At this point, we need a word of clarification. Many drug combinations are entirely safe but, with an increasing number of people taking drugs without medical advice, the risk of adverse effects is growing. Modern pain management strategies are highly effective without the routine need for painkillers. You can still buy Tramadol online, but you should keep it for the times when the pain is genuinely severe.