If you’ve been around any healthcare settings that treat people with chronic pain one term that comes up a lot is “drug seeking” or “med seeking.”  When it’s brought up it’s usually in a pejorative way.  For example “there’s another of those drug seeking addicts.”  Unfortunately, many people who are living with chronic pain are not getting their pain managed effectively.  In some cases it’s because the medical professionals are afraid. 

I have a lot of compassion for healthcare providers who teat chronic pain patients in California. On one hand the DEA is playing big brother and their war on drugs has now moved to a war on pain management.  If you want to really know how I feel about that go to my article http://www.addiction-free.com/articles/articles/view/war-on-drugs-war-on-pain-management and download it for free.

On the other hand when the medical professional takes a conservative track and under-prescribes; now they are at risk for litigation. The other big problem is most medical professionals don’t realize that being opiate tolerant is not necessarily opiate addicted.  Anyone who is on prolonged opiate maintenance will have built up tolerance and needs periodic increase in the dose.  Unfortunately, some people can also develop a condition called pain rebound or even hyperalgesia and now the medication has become—at least in part—the pain generator.
 
I invite people to eliminate the phrase “drug seeking” or “med seeking” from their vocabulary.  What people are really seeking is RELIEF.  They want the pain to stop.  They want to have some relief from their suffering.  They often; however, mistakenly believe that the only way to get that relief is by taking more medication.  In fact some pain conditions do not respond well to traditional mono opiate medication management.  If you are interested in learning more check out the other articles on my website or go to the publication page http://www.addiction-free.com/publications.html to check out the books that address this problem.

I want to let people know that Grinstead Consultation and Coaching Services is now offering a year long Addiction-Free Pain Management™ Continuing Care Coaching program.  This will be done by telephone so people all over the country can participate.  If you are interested in receiving free information and an overview of these services go to http://www.addiction-free.com/contact.html and send a request for this information.  Please sign up for our free monthly newsletter while you’re on that page for the latest information about Addiction-Free Pain Management™. 

I have heard for years that patients that come to treatment programs from other areas don’t get a continuing care program.  Or many people live in rural areas and it’s hard to get them to come to an urban center for ongoing continuing care.  That is why many people including ourselves are switching to a telephone modality.  This way we can also help people who don’t want or can’t go to treatment to give them some strategic structured protocols that could make a world of difference. 

In addition to our continuing care coaching, we also offer group and individual telephone Addiction-Free Pain Management™ Coaching.  For more information please go to our coaching services page at http://www.addiction-free.com/coaching.html and to see if coaching is right for you or someone you know have them take the quick coaching questionnaire. 

I just had time to look at an update from Join Together that I interpret as the Federal Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) planning to again move their “War on Drugs” to the pharmaceutical arena by developing a plan to “control diversion and abuse” of Buprenorphine (often prescribed as Suboxone), which is an anti-addiction medication for opiates.  For the full update please go to:

http://www.jointogether.org/news/headlines/inthenews/2008/feds-detail-plan-to-prevent.html

I just want to share my thoughts about Buprenorphine/Suboxone.  I have seen this fairly new medication help many pain patients who had either been abusing, addicted or suffering from pseudoaddiction from other opiate prescription medications.  Yes any drug/medication can be abused but this knee-jerk reaction and the use of scare tactics is not helping.  What does help people is accurate and objective information about this medication, which was designed by the National Institute on Drug Abuse and pharmaceutical firm Reckitt Benckiser to be resistant to addicts crushing the pills and injecting them.

Buprenorphine has been praised as highly effective at curbing withdrawal symptoms, and this medication’s wider availability has allowed many opiate addicts with limited or no access to methadone programs to get treatment. About 170,000 people have prescriptions to buprenorphine. Only a small percentage of those prescriptions are being diverted or abused but to hear the DEA talk it seems like we have a major epidemic on our hands.  I want to post one comment from the Join Together Update below that shows how this medication helped one person.

Posted by Suboxone4now on Mar 07, 2008 09:28 PM EST
I’m currently taking Suboxone to replace my close to death addiction to pain medications. I’ve been on the medicine for 14 months and in that time I have saved my marriage, kept my house, received a promotion, and rebuilt my relationship with my two children. I thank Suboxone for being developed. It gives addicts a chance to stop their addiction because withdrawal is delayed until the addict has his or her life together enough to then taper off the Suboxone. What is key to any success is an educated Suboxone Doctor along with group meetings and if you can afford it a drug counselor. Learning how to manage life sober is so important for an addict that I would say if that one part is not worked on and understood that I would bet my life on a relapse Suboxone or not. We all want to know how to stay sober. The first step is to help the addict not go into full blown withdrawal. We need to stop feeling sick long enough for us to work to a sober mind set. Yes Suboxone can be abused so can Ice Cream. If people are getting high off this stuff by shooting it then their addicts that will abuse anything. This drug taken correctly has no high effect at all. To me that is the true gift of the medicine along with of course breaking my withdrawal systems helping me stay off pain meds. Suboxone really has helped save my life and it makes me sad that it’s being shared in the news this way without saying but Suboxone used right can help save people from dying basically. I also think not all addicts have to go the Suboxone route. My thought is simple. Do what keeps you heading toward pure sobriety. If cold turkey is your way and you stay sober GREAT but if your like me and you just can’t because of sickness and your life won’t allow it then Suboxone can give you the time you need to stop your addiction and begin your healing. I also want to say that I plan to get off Suboxone soon. I can with the Doctors help wean myself in a kind way where I can get off completely with some insight that I might feel like crap for a couple weeks but I’ll be ready for it and that’s a big advantage for any addict heading toward complete sobriety.