Day: 12/12/2015

Thinking of you, Jane Disbrey

former head of Havelock was in chronic pain when she jumped off the Humber Bridge

THE former headteacher of Havelock School was suffering from chronic pain in her face when she jumped off the Humber Bridge…

http://www.hulldailymail.co.uk/Torment-Malet-Lambert-headteacher-Jane-Disbrey/story-28348390-detail/story.html

Mrs Disbrey’s husband Stephen told an inquest into her death she had suffered severe facial pain since August, last year. He said: “She suffered long periods of pain, sometimes up to 14 hours at a time.

“All she wanted was someone to give her a tablet to make the pain go away.”

Mrs Disbrey had been diagnosed with atypical facial pain, for which she had been prescribed gabapentin and carbamazepine.”  Jane always wanted an instant solution to the pain that she was in, but it was explained to her that it was a very difficult illness to treat,” said Mr Disbrey.”

She had told herself she would never get better.” …

Mr Disbrey said his wife had stopped taking the medication, which she was intolerant to, and had been about to try another type of drug to combat her pain.

Mrs Disbrey’s GP, Dr Richard Taylor, based at Willerby Surgery, said in a statement she attended with severe pain on the left side of her face. She told him the pain had coincided with dental treatment…

During another appointment on June 29, Mrs Disbrey was “tearful and upset” and said gabapentin had left her feeling “foggy” and experiencing severe nightmares.

Victoria Bell, a specialist liaison practitioner, told how Mrs Disbrey “became tearful and distressed” as she disclosed the impact of the death of a student, who had taken their own life.

Ms Disbrey’s pain was so severe she spent a week in to Hull Royal Infirmary in July.

Professor Paul Marks, senior coroner for Hull and the EastRiding, recorded a narrative conclusion, saying: “Jane Disbrey developed atypical facial pain in 2014, which was compounded by high levels of anxiety. Her pain was refractory to pharmacological treatment.

“She did not express any suicidal ideation on the last day of her life, but was seen to jump from the Humber Bridge on the 4th of August, 2015 after 6pm, and died instantaneously from multiple injuries sustained as a result of the fall.”

They’re gonna drill an oil well in my backyard

http://www.abqjournal.com/690302/news/vocal-residents-oppose-oil-well-plan.html?utm_source=abqjournal.com&utm_medium=sidebar+-+post+list+-+north&utm_campaign=post+list

Sandoval County residents packed the atrium of the county administrative building in Bernalillo Thursday to weigh in on a proposed zone change for an exploratory oil well west of the city of Rio Rancho, most them calling for the project to be rejected…

Rio Rancho resident JoAnne Gomez said her Oklahoma family tells her about the frequent nature of earthquakes in that area, citing fracking as a likely cause.

Alex Renirie, one of the youngest to speak during the meeting, said a new oil well would go against recent calls from President Barack Obama to move away from traditional energy resources.

“I know we’re considering this issue from a land perspective but, as a young person, I have to talk about the climate,” she said. “Recently, Obama acknowledged that, in order to avoid devastating impacts, we need to avoid digging fossil fuels in the ground.”

Matthew Spangler, a representative of Outer Rim Investments, a AMREP Southwest subsidiary that owns the proposed drill site, said residents should consider the economic opportunities…

Well, not exactly in my backyard, but pretty close. What’s not mentioned in the article is the current, very low price of oil. I have to wonder why any oil company would want to start drilling right now, especially when so many other drilling sites have been shut down.

Questions in my search terms

if a doctor prescribes a new rx a week later can the pharmacist refuse to fill it legally?

Say your doctor prescribes a pain medication that gives you more nausea than pain relief. You try it for a week, but just can’t get past the side effects. So, your doctor prescribes a different pain medication, but since it’s only been a week since you got the last one, the pharmacist won’t fill it.

First you have to determine why the pharmacist refused to fill your prescription, which may be very hard to do. In the above example, if you explain your circumstances to the pharmacist, it seems like a quick call to the doctor would be enough to verify your story and get the script filled.

But there are so many other reasons that a pharmacist would refuse to fill a prescription, like because the inventory on that pain medication is very restricted and the pharmacist can’t add another patient to her monthly allotment of that drug. And maybe it’s not the pharmacist’s decision, but the decision of your insurance company or corporate policy.

Both doctors and patients should be aware of the limitations that opioid restrictions have on treatments and change procedures accordingly — like if you’re trying a new opioid, maybe only get a week’s prescription, just in case you need to switch it out. Of course, this means more doctor appointments…

Most pain patients probably don’t complain when doctors refuse to treat them or pharmacists refuse to fill prescriptions. Considering the stigma and shame in treating pain with opioids, I’m sure many patients just go home and suffer, while others will seek out the underground drug market.

I would advise sending an email to your state’s Medical Board, Board of Pharmacy, and anyone else you can think of. Unfortunately, you will probably not get any help from these agencies, but if they hear from enough people, it might make a difference.

how many people have died in nm from epiderial injections

I doubt anyone knows the answer to that question, but here’s the latest on injections from the FDA:

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp1511754?query=TOC

(12/10/2015) Serious Neurologic Events after Epidural Glucocorticoid Injection — The FDA’s Risk Assessment

I understand that this is only about “serious” adverse events, but I think it’s very short-sighted to only look at the number of patients who have died due to injections. What about all those patients who have been disabled by the serious side effects of these treatments? Just because the result wasn’t death doesn’t mean that millions of pain patients haven’t been seriously affected by these treatments.

Say goodbye to codeine

http://www.medpagetoday.com/Pediatrics/GeneralPediatrics/55159?xid=nl_mpt_DHE_2015-12-11&eun=g875301d0r

Members of the Pulmonary-Allergy Drugs (PADC) and Drug Safety and Risk Management Advisory Committees voted 28-1 in favor of expanding the contraindication for codeine to include any pain management for children. More specifically, nearly three-quarters of panelists favored a contraindication for individuals under 18-years-old; others recommended a lower threshold…

A patient representative from Mount Pleasant, Mich., Dawn Nelson, PhD, urged the committee to reconsider broad restrictions on codeine use, noting that codeine alternatives such as morphine were too difficult to access. A better alternative, she said, would be limiting the contraindication language to children younger than 6. “A physician will not prescribe you with morphine if they’re not familiar with you.” Nelson added that her child would not have gotten any pain relief from her sickle-cell anemia without codeine…

http://www.raps.org/Regulatory-Focus/News/2015/03/16/21731/EU-Committee-Wants-Additional-Restrictions-on-Codeine-Use-in-Children/

These recommendations follow a 2012-2013 review, which recommended codeine only be given to children under 12 as a last resort after less dangerous painkillers such as paracetamol or ibuprofen. PRAC’s new recommendations are more restrictive than before, and if adopted, would completely restrict codeine use in children under 12…