Reimagining Pain in the Wake of the Opioid Epidemic

The following is a guest article by Vijay Yanamadala, MD, Chief Medical Officer at Sword Health and System Medical Director of Spine Quality at Hartford Healthcare. In 2017, after years of over prescribing opioids to treat pain, leading to opioid addiction for millions of Americans, opioid dependency was declared a public health emergency. Since then, the opioid epidemic has only worsened. The COVID-19 pandemic, and its impact on people’s mental and physical health, has greatly contributed to a rise in opioid-related deaths. When I was a medical student in the early 2000s, pain was viewed as a vital sign, like heart rate or blood pressure. In the United States, the attitude among medical practitioners – and largely influenced by drug companies – was that pain was unacceptable and must be treated. Prescribing physicians turned to opioids, so effective they could eliminate most pain, or at least that was their promise.  As a spine surgeon, I had the opportunity to gain valuable insights outside the U.S. healthcare system. I served in surgical mission trips to Kenya, Sri Lanka, India and Mongolia. In Kenya, for example, we did large spinal fusions for patients, never once prescribing opioids for post-operative care. The attitude and approach in Kenya was completely different. Pain was an unavoidable symptom of surgery and would be treated with a combination of Tylenol and physical therapy. Instant relief for patients was not on offer, nor was the promise of complete avoid...
Source: EMR and HIPAA - Category: Information Technology Authors: Tags: Communication and Patient Experience Healthcare IT Chronic Pain Hartford HealthCare MSK Musculoskeletal Care opioid crisis Opioid Epidemic Pain Management Patient Care Patient Compliance Physical Therapy PT Reimagining Pain Swo Source Type: blogs