Newsweek Article Reinforces Stigma of Pain Meds

By Karen Lee Richards, Health Guide Wednesday, August 11, 2010

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Today the American Pain Foundation (APF) sent out an Action Alert about a Newsweek.com article titled, “Prescription Nation: Why we should worry about prescription drug abuse.” The article is completely one-sided, focusing on the deaths from pain medication abuse. Sadly, the a...

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dianejw

8/11/10 5:43pm

Thank you for making us all aware of this disturbing article...i sent my email in to Newsweek...without you...i would not have known this article exsisted!

thanks again for sharing...

Red Lawhern

8/13/10 5:07pm

I posted the following to Newsweek this afternoon:

The many substantive criticisms to Raina Kelley's article should alert Newsweek to the lack of balance and sound research in her work. One can only wonder if she has ever talked with a chronic pain patient. I have -- with over 2,000 patients, family members, and doctors during the past 15 years, as a volunteer patient advocate for chronic neurological face pain victims.

Before passing judgment on the millions who live every day in agony, perhaps Raina should bother to talk with the lady who told me this story: "To understand what my life is like, you should imagine that you are followed around every hour of every day by an eight foot tall invisible demon. He pulls behind him, a small wheeled brazier of hot coals in which several implements rest -- a knitting needle, a lancet, a couple of scalpels, a pair of scissors... And every hour or two at random, he reaches into that brazier, picks up one of these glowing metal torture tools, and rams it completely through your cheek and forehead, grinding and twisting it behind your eye... REPEATEDLY! This is my life."

I do not doubt that prescription drugs are abused by many who treat them as recreational. But we must also keep sight of the need to decriminalize the use of opioid drugs among patients for whom such prescriptions are often the only thing that stands between life and death by suicide.

Newsweek: shame on you. You owe chronic pain patients an apology -- or better, a serious article on the state of medical practice that grossly under-treats their pain while labeling many for effective dismissal as head cases, by its use of terms such as "psychogenic".

Sincerely, Richard A. "Red" Lawhern, Ph.D.

Dr.KathyAbbott

8/14/10 9:39pm

Re: Raina Kelley Article

Individuals who have not suffered from debilitating pain may lack the compassion to report on this sensitive issue. While the wonderful advances in pain elimination continue to move forward, ignorant (often young) persons are insensitive to the terrible toll that pain takes in sucking energy and the will to live from people.

Parents and grandparents whose weakness from pain is too great for them to pick up their children and grandchildren, people who must exist on the poverty of welfare because of pain wracking their bodies deserve representation and compassion, not condemnation.

The abusers are few in comparison to those who benefit from opoids and other pain controlling medications. Why don’t you show us a balanced article that is sensitive and caring, representing the millions who suffer moment after moment and are ridiculed as “drug addicts?”

You may discover an entire class of disenfranchised sufferers who are discriminated against even by their own doctors. I challenge you to delve into an expose and challenge society’s irrationalities on this subject.

Dr. Kathy Joyce Abbott (Ed. D.)

Tonio Larabi

8/22/10 6:17pm

Yes, these medications are abused, but that is only a minority of prescriptions written and used. This is a regular Republican trick. When the majority wins, they are bad losers and make up their own rules.

I'd like to see a report of how many americans suffer from every disease that causes Chronic Pain and compare that number to those people who "they think" are abusing the medication. They do not have firm numbers on the abuse, only estimates, whereas we have absolute, imperical evidence od those people who's life depend on these medications.

It is all stupidity.

Judy L

8/24/10 5:26pm

Thank you so much for making us aware of the shameful article in Newsweek regarding all of us morons who are obviously trying to get high off the medication that our doctor's prescribe. I'm so tired of bureaucrats dictating what medications I can and can't take, and in what amounts, without regard to what my doctor thinks is appropriate for me. My doctor, who has many many years of education and training in this very area, and has been treating me for almost 20 years. But I'm sure someone without a medical degree, who has never even met me knows more than my physician.

I get so tired of feeling like I have to defend myself when I say that I am on public assistance, and when I say that I take Methadone for intense, intractable pain. Neither of those should be anything that any of us should ever feel ashamed of. How many of us would choose to keep our pain if given the choice of the life we live now, and having a productive job? Those days of feathering your nest on the Welfare system are LONG over, yet people still assume I am lazy and just don't want to work. I (and any sane person) would FAR rather work than live the life that has been forced on me. But we make the best of it, and try to smile anyway, and we hear "well, you don't look sick," and "well, couldn't you get a job where you just sit down a lot?"

But I have drifted from the point, pardon my rant. I have been on Methadone for 15 years now, and I have NEVER taken even one extra pill. Never. That's not what I need the pills for. Newsweek and Ms. Raina Kelley should be more careful before insulting an entire group of people. How about talking to some of us who suffer daily and just want some relief?

Here is a blog post written by someone even more incensed (and better with words) than me: http://thingsishouldnthavetotellyou.blogspot.com/2010/08/pain-of-newsweek.html. Please read. I am also forwarding it to Newsweek.

A.Cooper

8/29/10 8:57pm

Andrea Cooper
First of all, i am appalled that a lifestyle writer would be writing a feature about prescription abuse, pain medicine and so woefully distorting the facts to make her article so one-sided. As a person who lives with persistent pain, I can tell you that people like myself do not take opioids to get "high." we take them to regain a semblance of a reasonable life: to do a little bit of work, to enjoy music with friends, to take a walk. To live and not be tempted toward suicide. The fact that the author states that it would take more celebrity deaths to bring the problem to light is almost laughable. What about the millions of legitimate people with pain who are working with their doctors closely, every day, to refine their pain regimen; to work toward reducing their pain and getting more control of their lives? I'm sorry that famous people make stupid mistakes with disastrous results, but that should not influence lawmakers and policy makers. What should influence them are the millions of people like myself, who would give anything to not have to have a pain regimen at all. I would encourage readers to get their facts straight. I would encourage Newsweek to be more sensitive to a much more complicated issue in the manner it deserves, like it did several years ago in an extremely sensitive and scientific article (written by a medical writer) in which I was interviewed, about chronic pain that was well-balanced and researched and included opinions and information from a host of real experts in pain medicine and prescription abuse. You owe it to us, Newsweek, to rectify this insult.

One more thing…We, as responsible pain patients and caregivers, MUST keep our medications safe from misuse and theft. Do NOT keep them in the medicine cabinet or kitchen counter. Lock them up in a safe. Hide the key. Only take out as many as you need for a few days at a time. Do not tempt an abuser to help themselves to your lifeline. It's a sad thing that we need to do this, but in a climate that generates negative articles about pain medication like this one, we have to do everything we can to protect ourselves and those we love. And, don't forget to count your pills when you get them from the pharmacy. Mistakes happen--try proving that you were shorted after the fact!

lou

9/11/10 9:56am

What a silly and misunderstanding human being she is! She needs to get her facts straight (which will not be easy) before she infests such bias into other people's mind, which then goes onto affect those who suffer from chronic pain everywhere.

Just immature, lack of empathy and very judgemental, these are one of the worst to deal with, thank god your not my doctor.What goes around comes around.

Lou

Newsweek Article Reinforces Stigma of Pain Meds

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