Implications of Opioid Relabeling on Chronic Non-Cancer patients

INTRODUCTION Treating chronic pain is unlike treating many other chronic medical conditions. The diagnosis of hypertension and type II diabetes can easily be quantified using objective information such as blood pressure and hemoglobin A1c%. Health care professionals can use laboratory data such as these to reach clearly defined goals which are supported by strong clinical evidence. Pain is different in that there is no measured laboratory value to gauge the severity or, at times, the existence of pain. Practitioners rely on the patient’s own subjective information, which can be one of the greatest obstacles in opioid prescribing. Practitioners have to adequately treat pain in a manner that is both safe and appropriate for the patient. When inadequately treated, chronic pain has significant morbidity on the patient’s quality of life. It not only affects one’s social life, but also their work and school life. There are many different components of pain that could be improved other than for physical reasons, including economic and emotional. With this in mind, it also makes sense to help ease pain not only medically, but also with non-pharmacological therapies. These should be used in combination to achieve better results than with either treatments alone.