The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved a new Oxycodone (OxyContin) formula that releases the drug more slowly into the system. Although this is progress; is it enough?  Some people are very excited and think it is going to make a very big difference but others don’t think so.

Even though the FDA does warn that the drug can still be abused by taking larger quantities than recommended,there are many people concerned that this new formulation is misleading and some even suggest taking OxyContin off the market. I don’t believe taking OxyContin off the market is a good solution; in fact I think it is a very shortsighted idea.  For some people OxyContin is the difference between suffering and living in bed, to leading a much more productive quality of life.

There is really no such thing as a “Bad” medication; it’s how it’s used and who it’s used with that can lead to positive or negative outcomes. Someone is always going to find ways to abuse anything.  Bye the way, there are significantly more ER visits due to an over the counter medication—Tylenol/ acetaminophen—than for OxyContin.  Let’s be smart about education prevention and intervention then go for effective treatment.  I think that this new formulation is a good starting place.  At least it is now a bit harder to abuse than before.

The evolving need of people undergoing chronic pain management for safe, effective pain relief is driving research into new therapeutic modalities and fresh approaches to familiar treatments. New innovations involving both opioid and nonopioid pain modalities as well as nonpharmacological approaches are crucial because some patients fail to achieve a good outcome with opioid therapy alone. 

That is why nonopioid medications and nonpharmacological interventions are receiving greater research attention. Opioids are also the subject of new exploration, most of this directed toward separating desired analgesia from unwanted side effects such as euphoria, tolerance, abuse risk, addiction and constipation.

To learn more about obtaining better chronic pain management outcomes despite potential problems, please check out my article Overcoming Obstacles for Effective Chronic Pain Management that you can download for free on our Article page.

If you’d like to receive training for helping people with chronic pain and coexisting disorders, including addiction, I’m very excited to announce we are presenting my Addiction-Free Pain Management® Certification Training in Sacramento on August 5-7, 2010. To learn more about this 3 day 20 hour training and my other upcoming trainings you can check out our Calendar page.

You can learn more about the Addiction-Free Pain Management® System at our website www.addiction-free.com. If you or a loved one is undergoing chronic pain management, especially if you’re in recovery or believe you may have a medication or other mental health problem and you want to learn more effective chronic pain management tools, please go to our Publications page and check out my books; especially the Addiction-Free Pain Management® Recovery Guide: Managing Pain and Medication in Recovery. To purchase this book please Click Here.

To read the latest issue of Chronic Pain Solutions Newsletter please click here. If you want to sign up for the newsletter, please click here and input your name and email address. You will then recieve an autoresponse email that you need to reply to in order to finalize enrollment.

To see an online overview of a web-based delivery of Addiction-Free Pain Management® please go to this Link for a free demo.