myself and I know for a fact other chronic pain patients are very undertreated for their pain, as with myself they must have all documented medical evidence and specialist reports agreeing with a DX of pain before they would ever get opiod med s perscribed this seem s to be the common protocole here in Canada
For myself I have been taking opiod med s for my pain since 1992 and it seems that I received pretty adaquate meds in proper amount s years ago when I first started taking them than I have been receiving in the past few years seems Doctors are cutting back on the amount of opiod med s they script for myself and other s I know a definate pattern for the past few years personally I have never ever have asked for a increase in my med s I just answer the Dr question about my pain honestly and the Doctor has increased the dosage this also seems to have stopped
I have always felt very sorry for some people I have met that either do not have the medical evidence to support a Dr treatment with opiate med s either due to the insane amount of time here it takes to see a specialist or get Mri etc or they have severe pain from a medical condition that either has or has not been made by a Dr but no definative medical test exists to prove this dx here Dr are VERY hesitant about scripting pain med s without evidence supporting their claim and proving their medical justification in using them people in this situation I feel for and honestly wish I could help them but obviously can not
Here in Canada most of our medical costs are pain by the provincal goverment and the goverment tell our Dr s how much they get paid per patient I discovered that in 2008 a GP Dr in Ontario Canada gets $17.oo
per patient with a cap on the number they can bill for per day this I couldn t believe so their really is no financial insentive for a Dr to see and treat a chronic pain patient and for the Dr to be subjected to all the gov t interference and law s and rules for scripting opiate pain med s I mean why would a Dr see and treat me which at the present stage of my medical condition after all the treatment s and surgeries I have had the only treatment they give is basically perscribing med s and pain med s in particular which put s our Dr on the Gov t radare so why would a Dr treate me and other chronic pain patients when he can make the same amount of money for treating someone with a cold or flue etc and these type of patients are less work and gov t worry for them sounds bad but it is a fact here
Dr s due to abuse of our pain med s by drug abusing people and all the legal and Govermental rules involved with the scripting opiate med s don t really want to treat people like me or other s and finding a Dr to treat a chronic pain patient even with all the proof for the need of pain med s is extremely extremely difficult to find in Ontario Canada also when one is found that will take new patients the word seems to get out and around that he will treat pain patients and will perscribe pain meds he gets a huge influx of pain patients wanting him to treat them and this seems to draw attention to the Dr by the Gov t
Terrible situation here and is just getting worse and worse and alot of this is caused because the abuse and diversion of the Medications we need and must take and the interferance of Gov t and law enforcement in the treatment of us also add s to this personally I get just furious when I read or hear about the illegal sale or obtaining and mainly abuse of the medications I take Oxycontin in particular by people selling it for profit or abusing it this in my opinion is the main reason us Chronic Pain patients can not be treated medically properly just cause of the nature of the medication we NEED to take if I had to take for example insulin myself and other s would have no trouble finding a Dr to help us or being able tol obtain insulin from any Dr
And I fear nothing is going to get better for us in the near future and in fact I feel it will get much much worse for us in the year s to come
cheer s