Chronic (ongoing) pain is often prescribed pills for short-term relief that sadly cause long-term damage.
What is Chronic Pain?
Chronic pain is persistent and lasts weeks to years. It can be caused by inflammation in the body or nerves that are not functioning properly.
Cancer Disclaimer:
How Chronic pain is treated depends on its source. For individuals with cancer, chronic pain is treated differently than it would be from an injury or nerve damage. If you are interested in learning more about cancer-specific chronic pain, we invite you to explore Cancer Research UK. Please note that our website content does not address cancer-related chronic pain.
Chronic pain must be treated differently than short-term pain.
In most cases, chronic pain isn’t going to go away, but its effects can be lessened. There are dozens of treatments for chronic pain, and each person needs a unique solution, or more likely, set of solutions. Not all pain treatments are safe. Some are known to be dangerous, others are experimental, and others still pose relatively low risk.
One common treatment for chronic pain is the regular use of opioids. Opioids are not safe for long-term use and eventually reduce a person’s natural pain tolerance, making them dependent on opioids.
Most people are introduced to opioids when they have an accident or a surgery, and even if their prescription is just for a few days, their body’s reliance on the pain relief can lead to long-term chronic pain and thus, long-term opioid use.
Dependence vs. Addiction
Opioid Dependence
Reliance on opioids to get through everyday life. A person with opioid dependence is not addicted and can stop cold-turkey, but often decides not to stop because they no longer have adequate natural pain tolerance.
Opioid Addiction
A disease affecting the brain of a person using opioids, causing them to keep taking pills even when they no longer want to. The disease can be safely treated with anti-addiction medications, counseling, and time.
MYTH: Everyone who takes opioids will become addicted
FACT: One in ten people taking opioids will become addicted
The risks of taking opioids are real, but we want to make it clear that not everyone who takes opioids is predisposed to become addicted to them.
But as we said above, addiction and dependence are different problems. Long-term opioid use can lead to opioid dependence in anyone.
