I was given a pain killer for two situations in the last three years. In both cases, the doctors gave me a hard time about NOT taking pain killers. What’s funny in a morbid way is on a followup visit I was asked “how much pain do you have, 1 to 10?” My answer was that if I had taken the pain killers, how would I know?
” My answer was that if I had taken the pain killers, how would I know?”
In EMS we are try to get pain levels down in the 2-4 range. If you get them down to 0, your patient is going to be snoring in a few moments.
Then we start down the road of having to assist ventilations, sticking ET tube down their throat etc.
Five years ago, before my Dad died, he was 90 and in constant severe pain, the doctor didn’t want to prescribe an effective pain med. When I asked the doctor why he was against relieving my Dad’s pain his sole argument was that he didn’t want my Dad to become addicted. I got really angry, I asked him what the big risk of addiction was to someone that was dying.