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QUALITY: Pain, its treatment and hope amongst the insanity

I won’t rant on about it, but the DOJ headed by theocratic fascist John Ashcroft has declared war on pain doctors. For much more take a look at the Pain Relief Network’s site. And the arrest, imprisonment and career destruction being meted out not just to “outlaw” doctors but those in the forefront of science on pain relief has a visceral effect on how pain is treated for patients across the board. For a gut-churning example of how much pain rational intelligent clinically-educated patients are forced to endure by the system, see this article on the treatment of “My Left Lung” by nurse and patient Richard Ferri.

But slowly the tide may be turning. In an article titled Must We Die In Pain? the radical commies at Forbes note that little progress has been made yet.

In 1995, a group of researchers funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation published a shocking result in the Journal of the American Medical Association. At some of the nation’s top medical centers more than half of cancer patients passed away in serious, uncontrolled pain. But guidelines from the World Health Organization indicate that 85% to 90% of cancer patients could have their pain controlled by oral medications. It seemed like a solvable problem. The Wood Johnson Foundation and the Soros Foundation were among the groups that worked on trying to improve the care of the dying. (The Soros Foundation’s Project on Death in America spent $45 million on improving end-of-life care.) What do we have to show for it? Patients still die in pain. A recent study by Joan Teno at Brown University found that of patients in nursing homes with excruciating pain, 42% were still suffering after a second assessment.

But,(as certain politicians might say), hope is on the way. First, there is greater awareness among clinicians of this issue than there was some years ago, and the realization that pain patients are almost always not the same as recreational opiod addicts. In fact a relatively dispassionate reading of the data suggests that almost all deaths from Oxycontin abuse come in conjunction with other forms of substance abuse and have nothing to do with pain management patients. Second, there is better awareness among physicians of alternatives, especially for the dying:

Doctors don’t always know about alternatives to narcotics. Raymond Gaeta, director of the Stanford Pain Management Service points out that a whole host of treatments exist. One option is anti-epilepsy drugs such as Neurontin from Pfizer (Note: which as described elsewhere in TCHB is dramatically growing in use) and Topamax from Johnson & Johnson, which can ease the pain of nerves damaged by chemotherapy. When these medicines don’t work, there are local anesthetics, and drugs delivered directly into the spine by pumps such as those made by Medtronic. These pumps are expensive–costing some $10,000 per patient–but Gaeta thinks they’re worth it, even for patients who only have a month to live. Doctors also can simply surgically destroy nerves, preventing the patient from feeling any pain.

Third, much of the fuss about pain and the DEA and DOJ’s draconian assaults on pain doctors have to do with Oxycontin, and the ability of addicts to somehow break down its slow release mechanism to use it for a heroin-like high. At least one company, Pain Therapeutics, has two drugs in clinical trials designed to deliver Oxycontin-like pain relief without either the high or the addictive side effects. One is designed to reduce the addictive qualities of the opiate, and the other is designed to prevent abusers from breaking down the slow release mechanism. (Disclosure: I own stock in Pain Therapeutics. Do your own DD but obviously I think it’s a winner) Whether or not these drugs work, there is clearly a market for making a safe and effective, non-addictive pain killer, that will hopefully send Ashcroft’s goons into retirement–although hopefully he’ll beat them to it in January.

Finally the DEA and several consultants from academic medicine came up with some pain medication guidelines, that hopefully will make physicians more confident in their ability to use opiates without feat of arrest and professional suicide. Let’s hope that the “enforcement” side of the agency is kept on a shorter leash now that the “drug” side has created these guidelines.

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