More than 6 million addicted to prescription meds

THE OLYMPIAN | • Published October 07, 2009

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One of my favorite patients at work is addicted to pain meds. When she brought in the remaining pills from a quick-acting script to trade for a long-acting medication, I told her we needed to destroy the old pills. Tears filled her eyes, and her breath rate increased, anxiety forcing her to clutch the restroom’s door as if for balance. Although we now dispose of patient-surrendered medications in a sack of cat litter, I poured these pills into the toilet.

“You don’t know how hard it is to see you do this,” she said. I felt like Frodo (or actually, Samwise Gamgee, I guess) trying to drop the dreaded ring into the fires of Mordor.

You remember the ring from the Tolkien series: “One ring to rule them all.” The Dark Lord’s patent ring lulls characters to abdicate their will to it, ultimately predicating the character’s demise. At first characters think they can resist the ring’s influence, but all except Bilbo Baggins succumb to its spell, unable to break away from its power. It is a perfect characterization of addiction.

Washington state’s Department of Social and Health Services reports Washington state has made America’s top 10 list for narcotic prescription related deaths. Washington state’s prescription abuse rate has prompted DSHS to institute a Narcotic Review Program that uses evidence based standards to monitor Medicaid patient drug use. Practitioners with shady prescribing habits are audited and investigated, such as Dr. Antoine Johnson, who recently was arrested in Madagascar on charges of health care fraud in Washington state. Federal agents seized records and closed clinic doors and patients scrambled to find new providers.

America at large shares Washington’s problem. Dr. Mehmet Oz decried prescription medication abuse on Oprah Winfrey’s Sept. 29, broadcast, stating that what likely began as valid prescriptions for pain or anxiety have resulted in more than 6 million addicts today. According to Oz, if a person cannot go a day without a pill, he or she is likely addicted. Further, an addict has less than a 5 percent chance of recovering without professional help.

The body develops tolerance for addictive medications, and increases its resistance to the drug’s effects — requiring increased amounts to deliver the same results. A patient starts with a valid injury — say, a car crash or surgery — and uses the medication during recovery, unaware that the drug’s addictive properties are rewiring the pain transmitting system and creating a dependency to it. When the addicted patient tries to decrease dosage or quit the medication, she suffers withdrawal symptoms as well as a bizarre and alarming increase in pain.

Drugs such as Vicodin, OxyContin, Dilaudid, morphine, Valium, Xanax, Adderoll and Ritalin (among many others) require careful physician monitoring to prevent long-term use, and responsible doctors work to identify causes of pain or anxiety, utilizing multidisciplinary approaches to treatments including physical or massage therapy, weight loss, counseling services, meditation, or surgery. Doctors who indiscriminately prescribe addictive medications put patients at risk.

They also put their patient’s families at risk, as adolescents dip into the master bedroom’s medicine cabinet and ultimately end up addicts.

My brother-in-law’s drug addiction began with his mother’s Vicodin — the missing pills unnoticed until drug overdoses forced him to confess his drug history.

Like most medication addicts, he felt he could control his drug use. He had spent years learning self- discipline while training on his high school football team, and had organized his life like the color-coded shirts hanging in his closet.

He died last month due to complications resulting from his drug addiction, at 27 years old, 6-foot 3-inches tall, handsome, funny, intelligent, and unable to drop that ring.

The telephone number for the National Addiction Assistance Helpline is 800-559-9503.

Jill Wellock, a local freelance writer, serves on The Olympian’s Board of Contributors and can be reached at mjwellock@aol.com.