Pain management
A PRESCRI
FOR PAIN
Paul was prescribed OxyContin
after an industrial injury. But that
was just the start of his problems
M
y name is Paul.
I’m 51 and live in
a small market
town in the Peak
District. I enjoyed
a happy
childhood and walked straight into a
full-time job after school. At 18 I joined
a local concrete manufacturing
company and spent around ten years
hand stacking very heavy paving slabs.
One morning at work I injured my
back. This was in the days where
awareness around health and safety
issues was far lower than today, and I
had some physio and returned to work
a few days later. Over the following
years I was promoted many times, but
continually experienced problems with
severe, debilitating lower back and
neck pain.
Around ten years ago I was
diagnosed with degenerative disc
disease after MRI scans showed
damage to five discs in my back and
two in my neck, all believed to be
caused by the heavy manual job I did
for years. Numerous injections at the
pain clinic offered no relief and I was
eventually prescribed OxyContin.
Each time I visited the doctor the
10 | drinkanddrugsnews | September 2019
dosage was increased as it was no
longer giving me any pain relief, until I
was eventually prescribed 800mg per
day – but taking 1,500mg per day. I
would wake up around 2am then spend
the rest of the night thinking of excuses
for how I could collect my prescription
early. OxyContin was the last thing I
thought about at night and the first
thing in the morning. At this point, I
was no longer taking this amount of
OxyContin to relieve the pain – I was
taking it simply in order to function. I
realised I had a serious problem.
One tablet was supposed to last a
full 12 hours – I was taking my dose
every couple of hours. However I kept
telling myself I couldn't possibly be an
addict, as I had been prescribed this by
my doctor. There were times when I
would run out because my GP was on
holiday and the locum or other doctors
refused to prescribe such a high
amount. I would then suffer full-blown
withdrawal until I could pick up my
next prescription.
Around this time I was involved in a
car accident. While lying in the hospital
bed the nurse asked me if I was taking
any medication. When I told her
800mg of OxyContin per day, but
actually almost double that, she said,
‘You must mean 80mg.’ I replied no,
and my partner confirmed the amount.
I got another, better-paid job but
was still taking around 1,500mg per
day and was eventually let go. Sitting
at home wondering what I was going
to do, I started to replay things in my
mind – what if that car accident was
actually my fault due to the amount of
OxyContin I was taking? What if I
believed I was doing a good job but
actually wasn't and that’s why they let
me go? I decided I’d had enough and
wanted my life back. I made an urgent
appointment with my doctor and said I
wanted off all the OxyContin.
I was then told that there had been
several meetings held about me, and
my doctor had been reprimanded by
other GPs at the surgery over the
amount of OxyContin I had been
prescribed over such a long period. I
was then referred to my first drug
clinic, where the drug worker said they
couldn’t help me as it wasn’t heroin.
Another clinic told me the same thing.
I moved back to the small town I
grew up in and registered at the local
GP surgery.
The doctor drew up a taper plan
that I was determined to follow. Over
the following months I stuck to it and
was doing really well, managing to
reduce from the 1,500mg down to the
actual prescribed level of 800mg, then
gradually further until I’d dropped
down to 320mg per day.
Findings from the 2014/15 Crime Survey for England and Wales examines
the extent and trends in illicit drug use among a nationally representative
sample of 16 to 59 year olds resident in households in England and Wales.
In 2014/15, for the first time the survey included questions relating to
misuse of prescription painkillers (use of prescription analgesics by those
for whom they are not prescribed). Findings include:
• Overall, 5.4 per cent of adults aged 16 to 59 years had misused a
prescription-only painkiller not prescribed to them
• 7.2 per cent of 16 to 24 year olds had misused a prescription-only painkiller
in the last year, while 4.9 per cent of 25 to 59 year olds had done so.
• People with a long-standing illness or disability were more likely to
have misused prescription-only painkillers.
• Misuse of prescription painkillers is distributed more evenly across the
general population than the use of illicit drugs
• Misuse of painkillers was similar in both rural and urban areas
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