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<\/a><\/p>\nIf used for chronic pain, narcotics should be 1 medication\u00a0in an array of helpful treatments.<\/p>\n
Narcotics:
\n<\/strong>Narcotics include opium derivatives (Morphine and Codeine) and synthetic opiates (Methadone, Demerol, Oxycodone).<\/p>\nEffect of Narcotics:
\n<\/strong>Narcotics work at opioid receptors, where they interfere and stop the transmission of pain messages to the brain. They also alter your psychological reaction to pain. Patients sometimes report still being aware<\/em> of pain, but not having such an aversion to the feeling.<\/p>\nSide Effects:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n- sedation<\/li>\n
- nausea or vomiting<\/li>\n
- constipation<\/li>\n
- breathing difficulty at higher dosages<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Issues with Narcotics<\/strong><\/p>\n1. Effectiveness<\/strong>
\nWhile narcotics are great for acute<\/em> pain, they often don’t work so well for chronic <\/em>pain, especially nerve pain.\u00a0The negative\u00a0side effects can be greater than\u00a0the\u00a0good effects, making them not worth\u00a0taking.<\/p>\n2. Tolerance<\/strong>
\nOver time, your body gets used to their effect. So to get the same benefit,\u00a0a higher and higher dose is needed. Unfortunately,\u00a0the side effects continue to increase too. However, don’t mistake tolerance<\/em>, which is simply a physical process, with\u00a0addiction<\/em>.<\/p>\n3. Addiction<\/strong>
\nTrue<\/em> addiction is a disease in which people continue to use a substance (alcohol, street\u00a0drugs or prescription drugs), despite bad consequences such as physical illness, relationship problems or inability to function at work. Just because your body is tolerant to a medication, it doesn’t mean you’re addicted. Addiction is a behavior; tolerance is a physical process. However, a percentage of patients who use narcotics will<\/em> develop true<\/em> addiction, with symptoms such as lying about how much medication they’re using, doctor shopping to get more prescriptions, obtaining narcotics illegally, and using the medication to get high rather than to control pain. This may be a more likely possibility than previously thought, as seen in our current opiate epidemic.\u00a0 The risk is higher in people who’ve been addicted to drugs or alcohol in the past, and for those who have few other coping skills to deal with pain.<\/p>\n4. Side Effects<\/strong>
\nSide effects of narcotics can be significant. The\u00a0most bothersome ones are usually sedation, slowed thinking, and constipation, which can be severe.<\/p>\n5. Do Narcotics Increase<\/em> Pain?<\/strong>
\nAn under-recognized problem is that for some people, narcotics can set up a process where pain will increase<\/em> over time, even if the medication initially\u00a0decreases pain. Narcotics can cause what’s call hyperalgesia<\/em>, which is an increase in pain sensations. When this occurs, sometimes doctors think the medication isn’t working and increase the narcotic,\u00a0when in fact the narcotic itself is increasing pain. A vicious cycle can develop. As with all drugs, for narcotics to continue to be prescribed, it should be clear that they’re decreasing pain.<\/p>\nConclusion:\u00a0Pain is bad, and sometimes narcotics are helpful and should be used. Doctors and patients\u00a0need to be sure that\u00a0the benefits are worth the risks or are greater than the side effects. When narcotics are used, it’s\u00a0important to see if a person’s functioning <\/em>is also improved, in addition to a decrease in pain.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This article is\u00a0in our series on Medications for Pain.\u00a0What are your choices? How do various medications work? What are the pros and cons? How about side effects? Opiate medication, sometimes called narcotics\u00a0are medications designed to treat both acute and chronic pain. Of all medications for pain, narcotics probably get the most press and cause the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6091","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-1"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6091","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6091"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6091\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7994,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6091\/revisions\/7994"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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