<span data-mce-type=”bookmark” style=”display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;”></span><span data-mce-type=”bookmark” style=”display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;”></span><span data-mce-type=”bookmark” style=”display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;”></span>
Listen on Itunes
Listen on Stitcher
Listen on Google Play
You’ve probably heard of the opioid epidemic, but do you understand what it really is? This problem is affecting someone you know right now. This blog explains the problem AND a solution for the pain killer misuse.
For more than a day, a 7-year-old girl had been trying to wake her parents.
Dutifully, she got dressed in their apartment outside Pittsburgh on Monday morning and went to school, keeping her worries to herself. But on the bus ride home, (McKeesport, Pa., police say) she told the driver she’d been unable to rouse the adults in her house.
Inside the home, authorities found the bodies of Christopher Dilly, 26, and Jessica Lally, 25, dead of suspected drug overdoses, according to police. Inside the home they found three other children, ages 5, 3 and 9 month
Opioid Epidemic – How Did We Get Here
Pharmaceutical companies assured people in the late 1990s that prescription opioids for pain management did not make patients addicted to it. Diversion and misuse have become more and more widespread largely because health care providers began prescribing these pain relievers at a greater rate.
The subsequent result of narcotic addiction is an economic burden in which the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that the cost of prescription opioid misuse in the USA alone is $78.5 billion a year. This is inclusive of costs of healthcare, lost productivity, addiction treatment and criminal justice involvement.
So, how much do we know about pain-killer misuse? With the help of the National Institute of Drug abuse, we now know this much:
- 2 million Americans suffered from substance use disorder related to prescription opioid pain relievers
- 591,000 suffered from a heroin use disorder
Opioids, substances that act on opioid receptors to produce numbing and euphoric effects, are a type of narcotics and here are some of its types:
- Codeine
- Fentanyl
- Hydrocodone
- Hydrocodone/ Acetaminophen
- Hydromorphone
- Meperidine
- Methadone
- Morphine
- Oxycodone
- Oxycodone/ Acetaminophen
- Oxycodone and naloxone
Chronic Pain Management
Pain is a gift, albeit a rather confusing gift that our bodies have. Aside from the discomfort it puts us in, pain’s greater role is actually to alert us to any possible problem we may be having.
However, chronic pain is largely different. It is disabling, often leading to a prolonged physical suffering. It adversely affects the sufferers’ mental well-being. Further, it may lead to marital and family problems, loss of productivity and employment, and a generous array of medical reactions, which are often adverse, arising from long-term pain management.
With such a complex problem, do chronic pain sufferers have a choice?
Indeed, they do.
In the fight against long-standing pain, chiropractic management may be one of the best alternatives to opioids.
The benefits of chiropractic care in long-term pain management
When Prince died in 2016, there was much speculation about the cause of his tragic passing. About 6 weeks later, reports revealed that the cause of his death was an accidental overdose of Fentanyl. The drug which is a similarly potent synthetic opioid, was found in “exceedingly high” amounts in his bloodstream, liver and stomach.
Opioids are primarily used to alleviate pain, especially severe and chronic pain. But people misuse them. At first, they develop a tolerance of some sort. Overtime, that tolerance develops into addiction.
Let us get straight to the point. Opioid use is neither natural nor healthy.
In comparison, chiropractic care is. It has very few contraindications, very few side effects and do not have any addictive components. Chiropractors eliminate chronic pain at the source, using gentle manipulations to remove restrictions that cause misalignment, altered movement integrity and physiological function – all factors to chronic pain.
And here’s what the research says:
Our bodies are amazing wired to naturally heal itself. Alternatively, we can use our mind to relieve pain.
To expedite the healing process in chronic pain, the best method to use is an all-natural remedy such as chiropractic care. Ongoing chiropractic care and wellness visits can be had for an entire lifetime to bring the body’s health to an optimum level of functioning.
Talk today with our health coach and learn how you can live a pain free, fuller, more productive and more joyful life without relying on dangerous medications.
Read Next: 18 Years of Chronic Pain Gone by Dr. Elizabeth Weidlich
