Young Women and Prescription Drug Overdoses- Analgesics (Pain killers)

Young women are the major victims of prescribe painkillers

In medical terms, analgesics are drugs that alleviate pain. Analgesic drugs fall into broad classifications, such as non-steroidal anti-inflammatories (NSAIDs), COX-2 inhibitors, and opiates. Any type of painkiller is associated with specific risks, and it is the responsibility of drug manufacturers and prescribing healthcare providers to make patients aware of what those risks are so that patients can make informed choices. Prescribing physicians and dispensing pharmacists have a responsibility to ensure that patients receive maximum benefit of these drugs without suffering detrimental side effects.

Painkiller use is prescribed for either acute or chronic conditions. In cases of trauma, injury, or surgery, opiates or opiate derivatives are often the drugs of choice, as well as NSAIDs. In chronic conditions, such as arthritis, either COX-2 inhibitors or over the counter NSAIDs may be prescribed. For chronically painful conditions such as fibromyalgia, low back injury, or compound spinal fracture, opiate-derived analgesics are often the drug of choice when other medications fail to provide reliably effective relief.

Young Women and Prescription Drug Overdoses- Narcotic and non-narcotic painkiller

Both narcotic and non-narcotic painkiller use are associated with dangerous drug complications for the health of the people for whom they are prescribed of whom the majority are young women. It is estimated that prescription painkillers such as OxyContin, Hydrocodone, and Vicodin are responsible for five times as many deaths as illegal street narcotics. Prescription painkiller abuse is on the rise, and access to prescription narcotics has created a black market of addiction that was not anticipated by the drugs’ manufacturers who continue to produce these pharmaceuticals for legitimate medical use.

Physical quality of life can be damaged by painkiller use. The drugs may alleviate chronic pain due to injury, but the physical complications associated with painkiller use, such as hypertension, appetite and weight loss, associated neurological deficiencies, hypersomnia, and digestive disorders, may objectively outweigh the benefits accrued. Financial ruin due to acquiring a ready supply of the required drug on hand while tolerance limits increases after repeated use, and associated loss of self-esteem and social reputation, are other considerations that are not documented in a person’s medical record, buy still negatively impact a victim’s quality of life.

Intangible losses that cannot be tallied in monetary terms are the specialty of medical liability attorneys. Their role is to measure a client’s state of life before being subjected to a medication regimen and then compare it to their current state after they have followed a doctor’s orders. Dangerous drug lawyers are familiar with all the issues that are involved in pharmaceutical product liability law. They review the relevant records, literature and case law to ensure their clients receive due representation and compensation for damages incurred.

The physical effects of prescribed painkillers are amply documented. Selective and non-selective NSAIDs have been linked to increased incidence of liver damage, and to upper gastrointestinal bleeding that leads to metabolic disorders, anemia, and digestive dysfunction. In all this the biggest victims are the middle aged women

Young Women and Prescription Drug Overdoses- Investigations

Our young mothers, wives, sisters and daughters are dying at rates that we have never seen before according to the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This problem is one of the few health issues CDC is working. Actually for many decades now, the overwhelming majority of U.S. overdose deaths were men killed by heroin or cocaine. But by 2010, about 40 percent of deaths reported were women most of them are middle-aged women who took prescription painkillers.

These alarming revelations of female overdose death rates are closely tied to a boom in the overall use of prescribed painkillers. The new report is the CDC’s first to spotlight how the death trend has been more dramatic among women.

Women may be more prone to overdoses because they’re more likely to have chronic pain, the prescribed painkillers, have higher doses, and use them longer than men, as reported by the director of CDC’s National Center for Injury Prevention and Control. But doctors may not recognize these facts about women, said John Eadie, director of a Brandeis University program that tracks prescription-drug monitoring in the USA.

Overdose deaths from prescription painkillers skyrocketed over the past decade despite no major increases in the need for prescription painkillers over the last 20 years, said Chris Jones, a health scientist at CDC. Doctors are prescribing medications more frequently for patients who may not need them, a trend in the medical profession that needs to be reversed immediately according to experts.

Women between 45 and 54 had the greatest increases in drug overdose deaths, likely because of dependence on prescription drugs to ease chronic pain, experts said.

Young Women and Prescription Drug Overdoses- Solutions

A jump was also seen in visits to hospital emergency rooms. Painkiller-related ER visits by women more than doubled between 2004 and 2010, the CDC found. These numbers alone, however, may not tell the whole tale. “If one looks carefully at the data it can be quickly seen that the vast majority of prescription overdose deaths occur as a consequence of individuals combining these drugs with another sedative,” according to experts who studies drugs and behavior. The solution to this prescription problem therefore lies in maximizing prescription monitoring programs.

Health care providers should responsibly prescribe prescription painkillers by monitoring patients for substance abuse and mental health problems, discussing patient treatment options that don’t involve prescription drugs, and discussing the risks and benefits of taking painkillers for chronic conditions.

Patients should use prescription drugs only as directed by doctors, discuss all medications they’re taking with their doctors, and dispose of medication after they’ve completed the prescribed treatment.

Women should also discuss pregnancy plans with their doctors to ensure infants do not develop heart malformations and become addicted to opiates.

Young Women and Prescription Drug Overdoses- Analgesics (Pain killers)