# Hospital pain scale needs revision **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [July 6, 2003, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hospital-pain-scale-needs-revision/186615 "2003-07-06T20:29:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![koeeoaddi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/koeeoaddi/32/408_2.png) [@koeeoaddi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/koeeoaddi)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2003, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hospital-pain-scale-needs-revision/186615/21 "2003-07-10T23:45:23Z")
I am a Standard Pain Scale™ drop out. As a migraineur I am supposed to keep a daily log - the usual 1-10 deal. But I had to simplify it. One day, clutching my 5.75 head and wondering if, in fact, I was dealing with a 6, I realized that obsessing over the minutiae had bumped it up to a 7. So my new scale is as follows: 0 - no headache 1 - headache, can function 2 - headache, can’t function Works for me. ---
**Author:** ![norinew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/eb9ed0/32.png) [@norinew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/norinew)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2003, 12:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hospital-pain-scale-needs-revision/186615/22 "2003-07-11T12:30:25Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by n2o \* > \*\*Nothing is worst than being told that a patients pain level is 10 or 12 when they are sitting with not signs of pain period. no sweating, heavy breathing, screaming, ect… > > damn pill seekers \*\* You know, I had an interesting experience with my last bout of kidney stones, in regards to the doc thinking I was drug seeking. I had been dealing with the stones for a couple of days at home, because they hit over the weekend; then, on Monday, I went to see my regular urologist. I told him “I have at least one stone, but I don’t want to be hospitalized unless there’s sign of infection, could you give me a scrip for some pain and nausea meds so I can just go home?” “Well, you don’t look like you’re in enough pain to have a stone”, he says. “That’s cuz I swallowed two hydrocodone before I came here” I answered. “Where did you get them?” (he was alarmed) “You prescribed them for me last time I had a stone” “That was a year ago” “I know” “Well, I’m not writing you a scrip til you go have an x-ray and I see some stones” So, I went and had the x-ray, and it showed four stones. When I returned to his office, he told me he had orignally thought I was drug seeking. That doesn’t even make sense! If I was a junkie, would I have **owned** year-old hydrocodone?? ---
**Author:** ![Yllaria](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yllaria/32/3452_2.png) [@Yllaria](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yllaria)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2003, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hospital-pain-scale-needs-revision/186615/23 "2003-08-09T04:57:27Z")
Our hospital only has a 1-5 scale. Should I feel shorted? It also has those pumps that shoot a little jolt of morphine into your IV when you press the button. They work great for me. As an aside, I recently discovered that morphine works great for arthritis. I had been worried that getting up after surgery would be complicated by my bad knees, since I had to stop taking my vioxx two weeks before surgery and they were getting wonky. But the morphine beat the vioxx hollow. ---
**Author:** ![Mearl\_Dox](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/65b543/32.png) [@Mearl\_Dox](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mearl_Dox)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2003, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hospital-pain-scale-needs-revision/186615/24 "2003-08-09T05:25:03Z")
I’ve been in some pretty nasty pain before, including a kidney stone and kidney infection combination, and waking up feeling completely unsedated after hernia surgery. But I don’t think I’ve ever considered myself at 10. Even when I woke up after the hernia surgery and was begging for drugs, I’d still call that 8 or 9. The kidney infection, which had me writhing and vomiting so much that I was sent immediately back in the emergency room, was a 8. Normal Crohn’s disease pain is from 3 to 6. 10 would be “My intestines are hanging out between my legs” or “My arm’s been chopped off.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hospital-pain-scale-needs-revision/186615.md?page=1)