Spend my tax dollars on heroin, please.
September 16, 2010 - 12:58pm
There's a lot of hot air circulating these days about taxpayers having no voice and getting no respect. Well, I'm a taxpayer and I'll tell you what I'd like to see my money spent on.
Heroin. Pharmaceutical-grade heroin for chronic opiate addicts for whom other forms of treatment have failed.
A video commentary for Rabble TV by Shawn Syms (Twitter: @shawnsyms)
Here's a controversial thought: what if we spend half of your taxes on heroin, as you suggest, and the other half on education (assuming there's still anyone anywhere who doesn't know that heroin is madly addictive, and expensive).
That way, we'll only have to provide heroin for existing addicts (who are "grandfathered" into the system) and not new addicts. If you regard addiction as a health issue, doesn't it make the most sense to take the same approach that we'd like to see taken in other health contexts (namely: prevent it now rather than fixing it later)?
Spending funds on education and prevention is not controversial at all. And heroin/opiod-maintenance therapy is only recommended for chronic long-term addicts for whom other methods of treatment have failed.
So yes, I agree with you. And I wish others would support both sides of the equation though, not just the first. That is what actually is, unfortunately, controversial.
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More on the SALOME trial (Study to Assess Longer-term Opioid Medication Effectiveness):
* http://www.innerchangefoundation.org/
* http://ahamedia.ca/2010/01/08/aha-media-films-sam-sullivan-speaking-abou...
More on Insite:
* http://supervisedinjection.vch.ca/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insite
More on the Vienna Declaration:
* http://www.viennadeclaration.com/index.html
* http://news.nationalpost.com/2010/08/26/council-votes-to-endorses-decrim...
More on the BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS
* http://www.cfenet.ubc.ca/
I was briefly tangentially involved with the NAOMI study a few years ago before the Toronto arm of the study withdrew - I was involved in developing a protocol for what would be done if a NAOMI participant ended up in an Ontario jail. (Here's a link regarding the NAOMI trial, which compared methadone to heroin in opioid addiction treatment):
http://www.harmreductionjournal.com/content/6/1/2
In a nutshell: heroin has its problems. First off, it does not last as long as methadone and has to be injected several times a day, so the patient has to keep coming back to the clinic, which makes it hard to hold down a job, for instance. Also, heroin is more sedating, and is more likely to cause severe respiratory depression requiring treatment. People function better with methadone - this was found back in the 1960s when methadone maintenance was being pioneered.
Heroin would benefit a small number of patients, but based on current data, I'd treat with methadone 1st.
And yes - our federal government's attitude towards harm reduction is not only unconscionable, but also fiscally irresponsible. For the past 40+ years, harm reduction programs have been proven in study after study to reduce the costs of addiction.
Thanks for sharing your experience and observations, Sineed. Apparently the SALOME study has a couple of aims. One is to compare the results with heroin vs Dilaudid (because many people had trouble feeling any difference in the NAOMI study), and the second is to gauge the success of switching people from injectible heroin/Dilaudid to pills form after the first year of the study is completed. I'm pretty sure I've read some arguments about circumstances in which medical heroin outperformed methadone but I don't have them in front of me right now. I will take a look.
Gifford Jones says heroin would allow terminally ill patients to remain lucid and pain-free in their last days of life. My father was drugged up on a number of drugs and completely out of it in the days before he died of cancer. I wished I could have spoken with him a little at the end. My brothers and I were ready to punch out an oncologist and some nurses then. They didn't treat my father very well at all.
In the third and final movie in the "Decline of the American Empire" trilogy, the protagonist is terminally ill and befriends a young woman who turns him on to heroin.
Thanks for sharing your experience and observations, Sineed. Apparently the SALOME study has a couple of aims. One is to compare the results with heroin vs Dilaudid (because many people had trouble feeling any difference in the NAOMI study), and the second is to gauge the success of switching people from injectible heroin/Dilaudid to pills form after the first year of the study is completed. I'm pretty sure I've read some arguments about circumstances in which medical heroin outperformed methadone but I don't have them in front of me right now. I will take a look.
Medically-supervised heroin is better than methadone at retaining some patients in treatment; ie, patients who have failed methadone. IMV, heroin is another tool to have in the toolbox, and should be available for folks who need it; I like to put in my $0.02 because I often hear the benefits of heroin rather overstated by some activists.
I'd like to see a comparison of heroin with buprenorphine (Suboxone).
[...] I like to put in my $0.02 [...]
I may have to reach out to you for an interview next time I write about these topics, if you'd be so inclined.
I may have to reach out to you for an interview next time I write about these topics, if you'd be so inclined.
Sure; you can pm me. Availability-wise, I'll be EXTREMELY busy starting next Thursday, until Nov. 11th, working + taking an intensive course. After that, I'm good.
Cool, thanks Sineed. It may not be for a while anyway, so not likely to conflict with your busy period. Cheers,
Shawn
Here's a controversial thought: what if we spend half of your taxes on heroin, as you suggest, and the other half on education (assuming there's still anyone anywhere who doesn't know that heroin is madly addictive, and expensive).
That way, we'll only have to provide heroin for existing addicts (who are "grandfathered" into the system) and not new addicts. If you regard addiction as a health issue, doesn't it make the most sense to take the same approach that we'd like to see taken in other health contexts (namely: prevent it now rather than fixing it later)?
That's friggin brilliant. We know how effective public education has been at eliminating ignorance about drug addiction.
We're pumping millions of dollars into Afghanistan to help the CIA and their drug mafia pals to haul dope out of that country. You'd think our stooges would at least get something out of the deal, like some cheap heroin for medicinal use here in the Northern Puerto Rico. But no. The doctors continue to prescribe T-3s and morphine for those with excruciating pain and the dying. Big drug companies are happy, and the Yanks get to finance their end of the occupation with dope money.
There's nothing magical or special about heroin, actually. In brief: heroin is also known as diacetylmorphine - it's morphine that has been tweaked to be more lipid-soluble so it penetrates into the brain more quickly (fat-soluble drugs penetrate into the brain more effectively than water-soluble drugs, basically because we're all fat-heads). Within 15-30 minutes of injection, the body converts heroin into morphine. If you take heroin by mouth, it's completely converted to morphine before it hits your bloodstream. So the real problem is not the availability of heroin (it's been legally available since 1987). The problem is logistical, pertaining to the quality of palliative care.
Back in the '80s, when Dr. Gifford-Jones was promoting heroin as a magic bullet for reforming the quality of life for the dying, experts in pharmacology told the government that the availability of heroin wouldn't make the slightest bit of difference, explaining, as I just did, that heroin is no more than proto-morphine, converting to morphine after a brief period in the body. The government legalized heroin anyway, though I have personally never dispensed it. And there are other pain-killers that are more potent, like Dilaudid, and fentanyl, and are also safer in very sick and fragile individuals.
So if a person in excruciating pain receives no more than Tylenol #3, that's a failure of care, not a lack of availability of stronger drugs. Especially in North America, which consumes most of the world's opioid supply. The US, with 5% of the world's pop, uses 85-90% of the world's opioids, and 99% of the world supply of hydrocodone - that's the stuff in Vicodin.
Glad I stumbled into this thread. I'll have to consult my William Burroughs pharmacopoeia to respond adequately. He felt methadone was a waste of time for hard core heroin addicts. He championed a drug whose name I cannot recall which freed him from about as heavy a horse habit as anyone could have. And no, by the way, I am not an addict and have never used heroin (but I have a great interest in psychotropic drugs). There are traps medicine can fall into when dealing with such a multi-level problem as addiction; for example, concluding that because heroin is transmuted into morphine in the final analysis, we may treat the two as equivalent. This doesn't seem to be the experience of many heroin users, from what I read and have heard. It has been said that there are no addictive drugs, but only addictive personalities, and I think this is a key to understanding addiction. Has anyone heard of ibogaine? Reportedly 30% or so of hard core heroin addicts are cured with no withdrawal symptoms after one administration. A further 30% are claimed to become addiction free with repeated administrations and counselling.
The way I understand it is that morphine produces a sedated, drugged out effect in the person while heroin allows them to be somewhat lucid in their last moments of life.
Sineed, my mother was out of it on morphine in the last 20 hours or so of life. Do you think she might of been aware that I was there and talking to her? The nurse took her off all her normal heart meds but kept oxygen turned on. I noticed she stopped struggling to breathe so much and looked more peaceful for the last 12 hrs or so.
I think so, Fidel. Have you ever had general anaesthesia? I found I was able to hear voices and understand what people were saying long before I was able to communicate.
I was with my grandmother in the last hour of her life, and though she had Alzheimer's disease and had not been lucid for years, I could sense a level of understanding, if maybe on a purely emotional level, when I spoke to her.
Heroin is basically a form of morphine. It causes a more rapid euphoric effect than morphine because it's absorbed into the brain faster, but it then converts rapidly into morphine. Here is a picture of different forms of morphine - on the top left the "diamorphine" is heroin; sometimes also called diacetylmorphine.
I'm sorry about your grandmother, Sineed. That's tough. My mother was on a respirator and couldn't talk, I could sometimes communicate with her by pen and paper. But she deteriorated pretty quickly during the week she was in hospital.
Yes I've had anesthesia, but they must have given me a sufficient amount to cause me to go to sleep in a hurry. I can sleep through anything.
It looks like heroin/diamorphine has an OCOCH3 molecule on either side. Interesting.
It looks like heroin/diamorphine has an OCOCH3 molecule on either side. Interesting.
Correct, sir. To make heroin, you take your morphine and mix it with acetic anhydride, which is acetic acid with all the water removed. As you already noticed, the hydroxyl groups on the morphine are converted into acetyl groups, which makes the molecule more lipid soluble and better able to penetrate into the brain.
Heroin better than methadone for addicts: study
A study published Monday contends medically prescribed heroin is more cost effective than methadone for treating long-term street heroin users.
The people given the medically prescribed heroin in the form of diacetylmorphine were also likely to live longer than those on methadone maintenance, according to the study by researchers at Providence Health Care and the University of B.C.
Addicts stayed in treatment longer and spent less time in relapse than methadone users.
You can read the study here.
Morphine creates a dark, hallucinogenic experience that can be frighteningly real for you and the people around you. You go through withdrawel daily.
Cannabis, on the other hand, one can give up one day, mood is largely unaffected. It is not as strong/effective, but it rounds out the aggression and hostility that can also dominate the morphine experience.
As a mild alternative/supplement cannabis is a reasonable non pharmaceutical any person can grow; same with poppies.
It has been said that there are no addictive drugs, but only addictive personalities, and I think this is a key to understanding addiction.
Naw, that addictive personalities stuff doesn't make sense, bro. It predicts nothing, explains everything, and is circular reasoning.
F55, thanks for that study, which I think is the recent SALOME project. It's at the very least the offspring of NAOMI, both programs were run by UBC in Vancouver's DTES.
NAOMI had some absolutely galling ethical practices. Yes, the project was well intentioned and the findings were extremely important. But their resource (who, as usual, they underpaid) were DTESiders. They provided a number of their cohort with free high-quality heroin for the duration of the two-year project. They offered counselling, support and maitenance observation. Then, when the funding for the two-year project ran out, they stopped. Cold turkey. No more heroin, no more support, no more counselling. You can guess the results. Of the incredible success, in which addicts managed to either get off heroin or control their habit, all candidates except for one are either back on the drug or dead. There are NAOMI survival groups in the DTES. I've met NAOMI grads who are in prison for stealing because they couldn't afford the high-quality heroin the program had accustomed them to.
When UBC wanted to do phase two, which I think helped produce this paper, they approached Vancouver Network of Drug Users (VANDU) and NAOMI survivors for help. They duly told them to go to hell.
Thanks for that missing bit of info, CF. I remember watching a documentary about NAOMI, but I had no idea about any of that stuff. That's incredibly fucked.
Heroin better than methadone for addicts: study
So I got around to reading the study today. It's actually not a new study per se; it's a post-hoc analysis of the NAOMI study. In a nutshell, they took data from NAOMI and used mathematical models to extrapolate to long-term outcomes. Couple of points: NAOMI only recruited addicts who had already failed treatment, so you can't make assumptions about people who haven't failed rehab. Also, it only addresses heroin addiction, and Oxycontin is the biggest opioid of addiction in Canada (except in Montreal and Vancouver). And the advantages of heroin over methadone were modest at best.
The study I'd like to see is one comparing heroin with Suboxone.
Switzerland legalize prescription heroin for severely addicted users through a national referendum. The drug is prescribed by doctors and supervised by public health.
I agree with that. Though I think there's a danger of overstating its benefits. Drug treatments for addictions only address one aspect of the addicted person's difficulties.
Let me share some personal experience with pharmaceutical opiates. I've had 5 surgical procedures in the past four years that required general anaesthetic and post-op pain medication. I can't take NSAIDS (non-steroid anti-inflammatories) or codeine, so I end up with morphine (nasty) hydromorphone or percacet. All of them are effective for pain, but none of them is anything but a nightmare (literally) and a trip into bizarro land.
One surgery was in the US. They were, in my opinion, way too liberal with the pain meds. The rest of the surgeries were in Canada, and they were way too slow to respond to the high end of the pain scale (1-10, 10 being the worst pain you've ever experienced). I've spent some considerable time in Emerg in London ON, in agony, and then more in the treatment area, in agony. The London health care system has an extensive record on what I can and cannot tolerate as far as pain meds go. I, and others, shouldn't have to wait 10 hours for some relief from extreme pain.
There has to be something in between. I'm not convinced that narcotic pain relievers are the only way to relieve extreme and chronic pain. There must be some non-opiate that can be developed to deal with pain receptors in the brain without the euphoric effect that is so addictive.
There has to be something in between. I'm not convinced that narcotic pain relievers are the only way to relieve extreme and chronic pain. There must be some non-opiate that can be developed to deal with pain receptors in the brain without the euphoric effect that is so addictive.
Brains habituate, and they like what they like. Use converging methods for the pain next time, as the problem might be the quest for a single source solution to your problem, when a multiple factor solution might be the better path. Some use guided imagery for pain, some try to control attentional processing, some use cannabis, some people try to sleep through their pain, some try hypnosis, some reduce their dose of the target drug...you can do all of these with probably some positive net result.
How do you make policy for multiple methods I guess you can't - educating the public would go some distance, as would reducing the negative biases about drugs that affect brain functioning (e.g., brains gravitate towards addiction bulimics get addicted to vomiting from the head rush; some use chocolate, coffee, alcohol, sweets etc).
The big problem for drug users is when drugs are unavailable or too costly in my view, which may explain why I think the UBC researchers were in violation of ethics - they removed the supply.
Drug studies don't mean much without other methods augmenting the drug therapy, like talk therapy, and maybe group sessions so people can work through aspects of normal functioning that were ignored in the heat of addiction and other societal supports. Most therapies with drugs work better with augmenting therapies supporting the drug regime, don't they? Insulin without exercise isn't gonna be as effective as insulin with a vigorous 30 min walk every day.
I can't read research with the same focus as a younger person, but I didnt see the articles also discussing other methods for handling addiction that are vital, like residency, for example, daily or frequent group counseling. People when they're in a residence they have a community - and that community has 'resilience' - they all support each other. You can get heroin addicts off the stuff. But it costs money.
This is the problem with academic reseach sometimes - they're focused, great, but what about the Gestalt, where's that in the article? For example, substituting a drug is a cheaper alternative than doing all the socialization and social skills counseling and education that a person would need to get over an addiction - the in residence treatment, all that costs money and people don't want to pay it.
You withdraw a drug from someone's life without all those social supports and they're generally undisciplined in managing their addiction and alone; expect recidivism
True; drug treatments are in conjunction with a multi-faceted approach to help addicted persons.
We use a massive amount of opioids in North America; ie, most of the world's supply despite < 6% of the world's population. I believe non-drug methods of dealing with pain have been neglected in favour of pharmaceuticals, and we need to explore what they do on other continents (assuming they aren't just letting people suffer).
One of the problems with these drugs is chronic use causes a down-regulation of the pain receptors so that people feel pain more severely. (So my patients will pop Percocet for menstrual cramps, a drug that's really for if you put an axe through your foot, for instance.)
BTW, if you can take Percocet, you aren't allergic to codeine. They're in the same chemical grouping.
I find when I have surgery, they tend to overdose me on opioids, unless I stop them. Ask if you can please have a lower dose. It might be enough, and the side effects are less of a nightmare.
When I came home from my surgery they forced me to take meds home and wanted me on them all the time (it was rather serious surgery followed by coma and life support) but I didnt want any and they really really really want you to have them
Other side of heroin Gifford-Jones
I am no expert on drugs but here are some interesting comments on the banning of the medicinal use of heroin in Australia, childbirth, communism, and fundamentalist Christianity (www.nuaa.org.au/files/usersnews/.../UN49_midwives_and_heroine.):
It will come as no surprise to most users (and many non- users) that the prohibition of certain drugs is largely justified by the public’s perceptions of their social impact. These perceptions are often based on media portrayals of problems that these drugs supposedly cause. But sometimes the pressure put on governments to ban substances can lead to the loss of important medical resources. Most people may not know that heroin, for example, was once legal and a frequently prescribed analgesic all around the world, and was only criminalised due to a relentless, ideologically-driven campaign to demonise it.
It may come as some surprise to learn that Australians were amongst the highest consumers of heroin in its medicinal, over-the-counter form. It was widely recognised as one of the best drugs for the treatment of chronic pain, and Australians frequently purchased it in the form of cough syrups, tinctures and other pain killing remedies. Aside from these uses, heroin in its pure form was also the drug favoured by gynaecologists and obstetricians for the treatment of pain suffered by women during childbirth. The criminalisation of heroin, and its withdrawal from medicinal use, has left us without an important treatment option which, at one time, was widely supported by doctors and medical experts across Australia. So what happened?
A body known as the Permanent Central Opium Board sought, through the United Nations, to have heroin banned in Australia for any and all uses. The move to ban heroin was reinforced by the American media’s portrayal of the so-called “junkie”. Such stereotyping was a major component of the Cold War’s demonising of non- conformist individuals and marginal social groups. Heroin users were claimed to be part of a “vast Communist conspiracy to wreck civilization”. For a substance that had until 1952 been available to Australian citizens on the Life Saving Drugs scheme (a forerunner to the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme), the absence of any medical expertise in the discussion is rather striking.
The fact that a medical debate was so easily hijacked and stripped of legitimate scientific enquiry is evidence of American influence on politics and civic life in Australia. From this period onwards, many American values and laws would be directly imported, with little regard to the wishes or requirements of Australian citizens. The genesis of such values and the laws that enforce them can largely be traced back to the moral and political influence of American Christian fundamentalists.
The ethos of prohibition is a telling one. With its background in religious fundamentalism, it stipulates that pleasure in the world is fleeting and somehow wrong — this much is obvious. But it is interesting to watch these moral principles clash with medical priorities in relation
to pain treatment and anaesthesia. From the perspective of Christian fundamentalists, pain is one of the punishments handed down by God not for individual transgressions, but for the whole of humanity, due to the idea that we all sin against
God and deserve to feel such discomfort to remind us of the absence of God’s love unless we follow their repressive codes and norms. This is particularly apparent in relation to childbirth. Many Christian fundamentalists consider women to be the gateways of original sin and
Morality - based prohibition does not take pain, science, logic or reason into account.
Leaving aside the likelihood that prohibition of heroin part of their punishment is the pain suffered during
(like the abolition of alcohol before it) was doomed to failure, what is apparent is that there was little or no debate on the medical impact of the ban. Pressure trickled down from America to the Australian government, and from there onto Australian medical associations and their members to abandon the use of heroin for medical purposes. Many doctors were now arguing not on behalf of the medical fraternity, based on sound scientific principles, but rather in support of the government for political reasons.
I believe a non addictive, no high drug is being developed from some type of snail. I pray for thier success. I have family that are crack addicts that have done some really bad things and I'm terrified that if I get sick and have to make the choice between agony and becoming addicted to pain killers. I've seen how it suppesses the good in them as it drives them to keep in crack and I'd rather die then to have my humanity stolen from me like. I don't want end up like them, its why I don't do drugs, I don't even drink caffine because I'm so insanely paraniod of any substance that is even rumoured to be slightly addictive.
I come from a family with addicts in it as well, Brachina; it motivated me to work in addictions.
There are good drugs that aren't addictive, like Toradol (ketorolac), which is good for some pretty severe pain. It's like a super aspirin. And there's also tramadol, which is a narcotic, but it is supposed to be less addictive.
If you get into a medical situation, the best thing you can do for yourself is spell out your fears to the medical staff. There may be alternatives, depending on the specific situation.
Also, if you are in severe pain and you use narcotics, you are less likely to become addicted than if you were not in pain. Weird but true.
Gifford Jones says this is what North American doctors have said about heroin - that they don't want their patients going to heaven as drug addicts. And I can just imagine dying in agony with the most amazing cancer pain and fearing that I will ascend to heaven a heroin junky. It's my worst fear.
"There are good drugs that aren't addictive, like Toradol (ketorolac), which is good for some pretty severe pain. It's like a super aspirin."
Yes, I had some Toradol for an absesed tooth a couple of years ago. After spending an entire night in agony, it was welcome and it worked just fine. Some say tooth pain is the worst. I don't know. I've seen guys felled by kidney stone pain. I think maybe that's worse.
And I've seen a living being squeezed out of a woman's nether region. That looked a bit owey.
I like to think I have a high pain threshold, but I don't know that. I will, usually, put up with pain before I take anything for it. I think you need a workout like that.
Oh, uninterestingly enough, nicotine is a pain killer. The night I had the absess, smoking was the only thing that took the edge off. Unfortunately, it is a short duration pain killer.
Twice now I've beend in Emerge at London's University Hospital, with Rebecca West in complete agony and exhibiting serious symptoms.
The insocience shown by the triage team there has had me twice on the verge of losing it with them.
Last time, after suffering for three or more hours (40 minutes of which were due to some one in no pain and less distress jumping the queue because he brought a buddy who worked at the hospital, swear to the flying spegheti monster) we finally got to the bottom of the problem. They gave her pain meds at the pod, and sent her home with a prescription.
A prescription the doctor forgot to put his code number on. So here I am at the pharmacy, knowing Rebecca's pain meds are coming due to wear off. So I ask the pharmacist how long it would take to straighten out. She said she'd fax the script back, and then rolled her eyes. "Could be as long as 24 hours."
I. Was. Livid.
I went home and immediately phoned emerge at University Hosipital. I was, given the events of the night before, ready to fly off the handle. But they told me they had already faxed back the scipt with the code. And then when I hung up, the pharmacy called to say that they had the script ready.
I was, like, nanometers away from a total rageaholic meltdown.
Next time, Odin forbid, we are going to Victoria Hospital, even though it's a little further.
If I ever run over a rabid varmint that I don't like, maybe I will take that to University Hospital Emerge. Naw, I wouldn't even do that to an animal.
Unconnected to topic rant over.
Sorry.
The Ethics of Addiction Studies
The crux of their report is this: having access to heroin-assisted treatment changed their lives -- but the study's sudden termination left them all reeling.
"All the stress in our lives disappeared. We were healthier; we weren't resorting to criminal activity to get the drug. The quality of our lives was just so much better," says Dave Murray, the NPA founder.
Then, as suddenly as this new treatment option arrived, it was taken away. After a 12-month trial on medically prescribed heroin, research participants were only offered methadone or buprenorphine to treat their addiction -- even though the study specifically sought out addicts who had failed at these traditional therapies at least twice before. In Canada, these are the only two treatment options currently available to opiate users.
NAOMI researchers applied to Health Canada for the compassionate use of heroin for the participants who responded well to treatment, but in 2007 Health Canada formally disallowed the request.
"We're the only people in the world who were treated this way," says Murray.
"There are good drugs that aren't addictive, like Toradol (ketorolac), which is good for some pretty severe pain. It's like a super aspirin."
Yes, I had some Toradol for an absesed tooth a couple of years ago. After spending an entire night in agony, it was welcome and it worked just fine. Some say tooth pain is the worst. I don't know. I've seen guys felled by kidney stone pain. I think maybe that's worse.
And I've seen a living being squeezed out of a woman's nether region. That looked a bit owey.
I like to think I have a high pain threshold, but I don't know that. I will, usually, put up with pain before I take anything for it. I think you need a workout like that.
Oh, uninterestingly enough, nicotine is a pain killer. The night I had the absess, smoking was the only thing that took the edge off. Unfortunately, it is a short duration pain killer.
Twice now I've beend in Emerge at London's University Hospital, with Rebecca West in complete agony and exhibiting serious symptoms.
The insocience shown by the triage team there has had me twice on the verge of losing it with them.
Last time, after suffering for three or more hours (40 minutes of which were due to some one in no pain and less distress jumping the queue because he brought a buddy who worked at the hospital, swear to the flying spegheti monster) we finally got to the bottom of the problem. They gave her pain meds at the pod, and sent her home with a prescription.
A prescription the doctor forgot to put his code number on. So here I am at the pharmacy, knowing Rebecca's pain meds are coming due to wear off. So I ask the pharmacist how long it would take to straighten out. She said she'd fax the script back, and then rolled her eyes. "Could be as long as 24 hours."
I. Was. Livid.
I went home and immediately phoned emerge at University Hosipital. I was, given the events of the night before, ready to fly off the handle. But they told me they had already faxed back the scipt with the code. And then when I hung up, the pharmacy called to say that they had the script ready.
I was, like, nanometers away from a total rageaholic meltdown.
Next time, Odin forbid, we are going to Victoria Hospital, even though it's a little further.
If I ever run over a rabid varmint that I don't like, maybe I will take that to University Hospital Emerge. Naw, I wouldn't even do that to an animal.
Unconnected to topic rant over.
Sorry.
Feel free to rant, I feel the same about Etobicoke General, where all the local doctors refer to as death hospital.
I had a abcessed tooth while in the states and they gave me a shot of torodol in the ass and man did I feel good and was basically incoherent for the evening (some say here that never ended ;)). Vicodin was what they sent me home with tho