What would you do if you live in pain? Is taking pain medication before your scheduled abuse of medication?
Question by Simba: What would you do if you live in pain? Is taking pain medication before your scheduled abuse of medication?
Someone I love/care for is living in excruciating pain and is on pain medication. The pain is nerve damage caused when the cancer pressed down on the brachial plexus between the shoulder and neck. The pain never goes away completely and is causing shooting unbearable pain, tingling, numbness in the neck, shoulder, elbow and hand. Now both hands shake and his whole arm sometimes feels burning and painful most of the time. Once in a while he says, right now the pain is a 3 on the scale of 1 to 10. But that’s rare. We don’t even know if the cancer is gone because the oncologist said they only schedule a scan when treatments are going to be done and he received all the treatments they will give him without causing damage when it would do more harm then good. My question is does anyone know if there is a way to get rid of nerve pain? Also, when the pain is so great you can’t wait after taking pain medication in 3 hours and you have to wait another hour before you can take it again is this considered abuse of the medication because that’s what his PCP said? He can’t even shave or hold a cup, or eat without his hands shaking. We just don’t know what to do. Anyway, your answers have always helped before and thank you in advance, I was just wondering if others think of this as drug abuse. I sure don’t but if you could give me your opinions, it would be appreciated.
Best answer:
Answer by gallop
It could be looked upon as abuse of the drug. He really needs better pain management than he is getting. Many years ago a friend of mine was in a car accident that caused damage and inflammation in her brachial plexus, and she was in the same unrelenting pain that you describe. She ultimately underwent a procedure to block it, but I can’t recall what it was. There were risks such as facial paralysis, but she only experienced relief of pain, and never developed any of the potential negative effects. He needs to see a neurologist to discuss options. The pain meds obviously aren’t adequate to manage his pain,
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