Hospital doesn't have pain relief after surgery

Another hospital doesn't have dilaudid available! And that's the only pain med that works for me. Even dilaudid only helps in high doses. It's tough being opioid resistant!

I went in for a breast repair after my cancer doc botched the lumpectomy. I guess the new technique is a breast lift along with removing the tumor. Only he pulled everything up so tight he inverted the nipple and the entire areola and it looked like a Koala's mouth. So I had to skip radiation and get plastic surgery.

I woke up in extreme pain. They gave me everything they had, but I simply don't react to opioids that have to be metabolized. It's a hereditary thing in my family, and it's not unheard of, although not common.

I got them to give me 10 mg Norco, which is partly metabolized to dilaudid, and I was able to metabolize enough of the Norco to be able to go home. It's been 2 days now and I can get something to eat. I only take tramadol which does about nothing for pain but does raise serotonin which makes me happier.

I'm planning on having knee surgery soon, so I guess I have to find another hospital and ask about policies.

I have read several articles about hospitals running short on injectable opiates due to covid patients. Unfortunately, you have no way of being sure if you will receive a specific drug even if you ask ahead of time.

A medical professional I knew once said no one ever died from pain. Times change.

And declining mental health and a failure to thrive, including at risk ideation. (severe) HT

This is the second hospital where I have had surgery that doesn't have dilaudid. The first, the second largest hospital in our large city, has a policy against giving more than .2 mg (yes, there's a decimal point in front of the 2) once after surgery, because they lost some patients. Yeah! You lose patients when you don't watch them!! I saw exactly that. Now I can't ever trust the second hospital, actually a surgery center attached to a very large clinic, but in the same network. They don't even have dilaudid in the building.

I'm sure I'm not the only person who doesn't get much, if any, pain relief from opioids that have to be metabolized. Dilaudid works instantly, doesn't have to be changed like the others. It's a genetic thing, runs in my family.

1 day at a time - yes, and it's not just pain that's being ignored by new docs. The new ER doc in the small hospital closest to me (15 miles) refused to treat my tachycardia event that had lasted over 6 hours at 165 bpm and more, because I had already taken Inderal, which wasn't working. He wanted me to stay in the hospital overnight even though he wasn't going to give me Atenolol, which I stupidly didn't take at home. So I went home ama, still having tach, and took the Atenolol and got better I get these events all to often, nearly always from ingesting sulfites hiding in food, and I can usually take care of myself, but a few times I have needed to go to the ER, once for cardioversion, and this attack was getting close to that level.

Now where can I go for care? Can I trust the next choice, an hour away?

Sharon, There are a couple of hospitals where I have had surgery that are an hour away and have had dilaudid for me. I was just trying to use one that was closer for my driver since I was having outpatient surgery.
As for emergency care - I'll have to use one of the hospitals that are 45 min to an hour away. The place I went for surgery doesn't have serious emergency care, until the new hospital section opens, hopefully within a month.

The problem is that several hospitals in my not really far outlying rural area and many other areas around the main city hospitals have been forced to shut down by ruthless competition between two competing insurance company/hospital systems. I don't understand why this has been allowed to go on. So, a couple of my previously acceptable independent hospitals are no longer. The one that's left within heart attack driving distance is unacceptable - as I described earlier. It's bad enough to have to wait over 20 minutes for an ambulance, like the time I had a heart attack and had time for a shower and to change clothes, but then to have at least a 45 minute ambulance ride to a hospital where you can be treated is ridiculous, and possibly lethal.

We patients must become aware of our conditions and how to manage them and where we can get assistance. One thing that can help is to have a large envelope of information attached to the refrigerator labeled in case of emergency - for ambulance personnel - and to work in our communities to have ambulance services made aware to look there for the envelope. This is common in places where there is a large retirement community, like Sun City, AZ.

I keep learning from my mistakes.

M&G: My phone automatically changed ICE into in Case of emergency. If I put in my husband's name or number my phone recognizes it as that as my ICE.
In the large red envelope on the fridge there is a form for Power of Attorney.
I also keep a tiny thumb drive with information in my wallet, but unfortunately most first responders and hospitals will ignore this. I'm looking to figure out a way to have this information on my phone, like I keep my shopping list. Not sure yet how to do this. Maybe someone will come up with an answer. Just have to be careful what information is on phones in case of theft. No passwords.