I was denied sedation/effective pain meds before a procedure pretty recently. Despite the fact that I spent the entire time literally screaming in pain, they dismissed it as “anxiety” and did nothing to help.
I also received very little when I first came into the hospital - as my body was flooding with literal shit and I was fucking dying. They let me writhe and roll around for hours before they mercifully knocked me out for my operation.
I’m traumatized to the point where watching movies where people experiencing pain is upsetting. I was watching fucking Avatar the Last Airbender and wincing every time someone got punched or kicked.
I also go back to getting my IUD put in - again, another extremely painful procedure that is “not supposed to hurt” so there is no option for sedation or effective pain meds.
It feels like asking for pain meds gets you labeled as a drug seeker/addict too. I made the mistake of mentioning that I smoke weed (because I knew the anesthesiologist needs to know that) and it feels like it was instantly assumed that I’d be a pill popper too.
And I have extremely high pain tolerance. I’ve literally had people whip me until they’ve drawn blood. I’ve worked a fast food shift with a second degree (even a bit of third degree) burn going down the majority of my arm. I’m not a wuss, I know how to breathe in ways that help, I know how to go to a mind palace, but Christ, when you start digging around in someone’s guts with sharp objects, that’s not really something you can meditate away!
Is it training? Is it the fact that becoming a doctor in the U.S. requires the kind of upper middle class upbringing that doesn’t tend to help people develop empathy?
As others have said, it’s a backlash against the pill mills, we have overcorrected.
I get migraines occasionally, and have Imitrex shots for them. I love that drug because it is not at all druggy - it leaves me clear headed with no migraine, there is a nauseating unpleasant rush when administered, then it’s just like walking back in time, headache fades to nothing.
But a handful of times (like literally 6 times in 30 years) I get status migraine. Imitrex does not avail me, 4 days no food no water I will puke even a spoonful of water.
I used to be able to go to the doctor and get some shots with some opiate and fenergan. They would do one, I would still be puking and crying, they would come back every 20 minutes or so and do another until I was so far away from the pain it wasn’t bothering me. Then I could sleep and it worked every time, even though it did not work by killing the pain immediately (painkillers don’t work for migraine) the high plus sleep always worked. Maybe $50 -$100 total cost.
But the last two times I got this, the doctor couldn’t do that, it was outlawed. They sent me to the emergency room. Cold IV in a cold room, some advil stuff that doesn’t work, then send me home still hurting, can’t sleep, headache 2 more days but I don’t die from dehydration. $1,600 for a worse result.
I understand why they say the opiates don’t work for migraine, they don’t directly kill the pain. But the previous protocol worked, and with electronic health records, can they not tell this is a very infrequent event for me? I don’t even like downers. I just want the headache to break and that was the only protocol that ever worked.
To add to the backlash portion: doctors are monitored for what rxs and how many they write for controlled substances. Pharmacies are monitored for how many controlled substances they dole out. Some rural pharmacies will refuse to take on new patients with pain meds (ex: you have a recently-diagnosed cancer patient who lived in the middle of nowhere all their life, and they can’t get morphine because their local pharmacy refuses to take on another scheduled rx). Pain management typically dictates you get a few days at a time and have to be reassessed before you can get another rx, so that means throwing another one on to the pile for the doctor and pharmacy, which means more liability.
Source: spouse worked ambulatory trying to coordinate with bumfuck nowhere pharmacies to get cancer patients their meds.
Don’t know man but the doctors here be like “just take a paracetamol”.
They probably get a ton of drug addicts asking for narcotics. And probably had made a lot of involuntary drug addicts over prescribing narcotics.
Some drugs are quite dangerous and it should be understood why doctors are wary of just prescribing it so easily.
I can only tell you it’s not like this in Germany but still dependant on doctors.
On one side you have those that know that pain can get chronic if untreated and they will employ countermeasures. No sense in needless pain.
On the other hand you have some bad doctors that are unaware and unempathic and can not relate to the illnesses they even treat. There you might have issues then.
Its because of crackdowns after the opioid epidemic years ago. Doctors were handing out oxycontin because the manufacturers marketed it as being non addictive. Apparently medical professionals actually believed this.
If you want something dont mention illicit drug use. But it probably won’t make any difference
I can see from you talking about IUDs that you are a woman.
Which I believe answers your question, especially if you happen to be a non-white woman.
Doctors, Even female doctors, even female doctors of color, are incredibly dismissive of pain in women, and frequently hand wave it away as the woman being hysterical, over reacting, anxiety, etc etc.
I’m a guy, but I know this statistically, and I also know it from witnessing how doctors treated female family members who were in pain. . and from my personal witnessed experience, I’d say female doctors are even worse about it than male doctors.
also, on an unrelated note, does anyone else cringe when seeing/using the word female? even if its in a grammatically correct place to do so, thanks to fucking incels and their weird ass attempting to turn the word into an insult?
It’s because you’re a woman. It’s double bad if you are also a woc. We are nowhere near close to even beginning to fix this. It’s systemic, and no one in power in the medical field gives a shit. Because only women and POC suffer from this.
This is marginally related but in case anyone else doesn’t know: dental procedures are not supposed to hurt.
I grew up terrified of dentists and ended up not going for nearly 10 years because of the fear/pain. I finally gave in when a tooth broke in half. The dentist I went to gave me the regular amount of numbing stuff and about 5 mins in saw in my face how much pain I was in and from then on she always gave me extra. I just have a high tolerance for the stuff and had never been receiving enough.
Word. I teared up out of happiness after a dental hygienist (who I currently see) offered me numbing gel for my gums during a cleaning (even let me choose the flavor) in a totally non-judgmental way. I was in my late thirties and I didn’t know any dentists would be willing to offer that sort of stuff to adults.
About half my teeth are now hollow stumps, i finally decided I’d look into getting treatment in spite of being scared off by stories of $50,000 replacement operations without anaesthetic. (Australia btw).
Thanks for the reassurance.
I got surgically sterilized because the pain from that was less than what an IUD would have been.
The only pain I felt was for the initial IV stick. After that it was nothing.
I will refuse any painful procedure that doesn’t have adequate pain relief. I don’t care if I die.
Medicine keeps getting away with this shit because women just accept it. Endometrial biopsy? Only if I’m completely out. If not I guess I’ll enjoy my hospice drugs while I’m dying.
IUD? Lol I just cut my shit out instead. I need hormonal treatment for endometriosis still, but I just take hormone blockers for it. Way better than dealing with sadists.
I’m too fed up to live through this shit anymore. I have no kids IDGAF.
Part of why my condition got so bad to begin with was because I’ve had so many bad experiences with doctors that I didn’t go to the hospital until I started feeling unbearable pain. I spent a full two weeks with an infected abscess just getting worse and worse because I figured that whatever it was would be blown off if I went to the hospital - because that happens any time I’ve ever gone to an ER.
I need to get my IUD replaced (it’s been 10+ years) and I’m terrified. I don’t have insurance, so my best option is Planned Parenthood, who told me that it was “just a little pinch.”
I’ve been fucked with knives and wartenberg wheels (abusive BDSM relationship). That shit was not “a little pinch.” I filled up a diaper with blood afterwords.
It’s to the point where I avoid seeing doctors, unless it’s the nurse practitioner who does my hormones - he’s the only doctor I’ve felt listened to me.
They’re so damn condescending too - I’ve taught biology and chemistry - I can understand a real explanation of what’s happening and want one!
Completely normal. I had hemorrhoid surgery and got 3 fucking pills. Recovery was supposed to be 1 week. It was more 4 months.
I live with constant back pain and fall all the time. They tell me to take ibuprofen. Which does fuck all.
Probably just thanks to insurance companies yet again
Doctors don’t get to make their own decisions anymore, they’re paid more like car mechanics and get a “job rate”.
Change a tire? It’s billed at $28 bucks. Doesn’t matter if it takes you 10 minutes or an hour. Air and balancing is included. Anything extra you don’t get paid for.
Gotta put in an IUD? You get $500 for the job, included is one shot of pain meds, the IUD, and one set of sterile equipment. Pain meds not working so great on this patient? Insurance doesn’t pay for extra, outpatient center doesn’t get paid for it or has to fight insurance for it.
Same for novocaine in dental work.
Insurance is terrible.
I actually don’t have insurance so it probably wasn’t a factor.
I am super fucked lol.
The fact that insurance companies are allowed to deny claims on the grounds and on medically necessary against doctor’s orders without being required to pay for second opinion from a doctor is insane. They are literally a core operating part of the medical system and it’s the most dysfunctional part
Wtf? No this is not normal. My wife even gets pain meds for the Dental Hygienist, because she has a fear for the dentist or anything dentist related. I think it is absolutely unnecessary, but maybe she has hyper sensutive teeth or something. I’m not a doctor. Anyways, the pain meds help her, so she gets them, regardless of whether it is just phychological or not.
I think you’re just suffering from the ridiculousness that calls itself the US healthcare system.
I’m going to mostly focus on the more legitimate answers since you already seem to know some of this was possibly / probably oversight / neglect and that they should have given you more.
a) the big one is pressure from regulatory agencies to prescribe less narcotics. Some of this is legitimate; a lot of the opiate crisis was started by pharma companies lying about how habit forming their medications are and intentionally encouraging dependency through overprescribing to sell more, but a lot of it is also just straight up puritanical and part of efforts to disrupt minority communities that are more affected by illicit drug use. In the end though, even if they don’t share the stigmatizing view of it, there’s little individual prescribers can do about it.
b) there’s huge pressure in institutional environments to do ANYTHING to prevent falls. In addition to getting stingy with sedatives that might make you dizzy there’s also pressure to have 1:1 care where people watch the patient in the bathroom and we used to even restrain old people to keep them from falling (although thank goodness that’s finally falling out of favor). To get rid of that we’d have to accept that sometimes people just fall and crack their head open and die and that’s life but we’re just not there yet as a society. In the US everything needs to be someone’s fault and if the doctor prescribes a sedating med and I give it and you fall, it’s partially considered my and the doctor’s fault. If we do ALL the environmental AND don’t give sedating meds, it’s considered less our fault.
c) There’s legit specific medical reasons sometimes. If you had a bowel obstruction opiates are actually specifically contraindicated since they’re the medications MOST likely to cause constipation. Now if surgical intervention was the best option it might make sense to give them anyway, but there may have been some waffling on what the best option was and they couldn’t un-give you the meds if the final decision was to have you pass it with medication / enemas instead of surgery. And bowel surgeries have a huuuge possibility of sepsis and having to parts of the bowel removed and having to get vitamin shots (once had a bypass patient so iron deficient she stated hallucinating) so that’s not a decision to make lightly.
Doctors see so many people seeking to fuel their addiction that they can no longer tell who isn’t. Addicts seek out information on what people with rail problems say and how they act - they practice those things. As such they cannot tell who is real.
I am sorry to inform you good sir or madam that you have taken part in what is known as malpractice. You should contact a lawyer immediately and change your health care provider if you are able to do so in whatever region you are located.
