Sedatives are sometimes used as a part of a detox program for opiate addiction, so maybe MJ had so much trouble sleeping because he wasn’t doped up on oxicontin or smack? I doubt ambien would even make a dent in that kind of insomnia.
[quote=“incidental, post:40, topic:507599”]
Right, right, usually, yes. Don’t some low-cost clinics have their own pharmacies, too, so they can charge closer to cost and patients don’t have to pay the uninsured mark-up at regular pharmacies?
I work on the veterinary side, where we do stock our own meds (I do the purchasing!). So sometimes I forget the differences. The rules (Rx Laws) are identical, though, and a lot of the meds we use are off-label human drugs.
I have absolutely NO sympathy for junkies, whether they be a street addict or a famou person.
I have suffered from insomnia all my life, and I was hooked on sleeping meds. It is a bitch to get off them, but one thing everyone needs to remember: People die from sleeping pills, but nobody ever died from lack of sleep.
My aunt’s fiance did, as did the father of one of my friends as a kid. Swing shift insomnia, driving home from work, fell asleep and drove into a bridge abutment and a telephone pole respectively. While I agree with you that a certain amount of insomnia is the lesser evil than addiction, I find your statement overly simplistic and patently false.
We have the answer, I think.
It’s not common, but…
So I guess: sleeping in a cool dark room, not exercising or eating a big meal several hours before bedtime, reading a dull book, and peaceful meditation (like we ordinary insomniac peons are told ad nauseum all the goddam time :rolleyes:) didn’t do the trick for MJ?
I haven’t slept well in decades, no matter WHAT I try. As horrendous as MJ’s situation was, one little teeny part of me can sympathize with wanting to get some actual sleep.
What the hell happened to him in 2005, after the trial, that brought him to this? And bedsores??? How could he have even performed in practice sessions with bedsores? I wonder if the real, whole story will ever come out.
Harriet the Spry said:
That would be an explanation, but it is rather a zebra of an explanation. I don’t know much about bedsores, or why they are so hard to cure (as Qadgop states), but his insomnia issues could well stem from his history of being burned in the fire and then a long history of plastic surgery, providing pain issues and addiction to painkiller issues. Not to mention, didn’t he hurt his back or something?
So the use of heavy sedatives to combat pain med addiction and get sleep seems reasonable. The doctor claims the propofol was being used for about 2 months, then he was trying to wean off the propofol and so using the other sedatives. Which is what lead to the combination of drugs used.
From the story on CNN, it is often used in clinical settings, not just Operating Rooms, but it still has to be closely monitored. Advantages: fast acting, fast clearing, not normally addictive. Disadvantages: very easy to go from slightly loopy to stops breathing.
Apparently the addictions described in the article Malleus involve not so much addictions to the drug as to the ability to relax or sleep easily and quickly. Although there apparently is a dissociative state that some find pleasant, which fosters abuse.
Harriet the Spry said:
incidental said:
I think the point was the anesthesiologists did it, not the doctors who were performing the procedure (endoscopy, minor surgery). If she’d said “surgeons” for the second, the distinction would have been more clear, but it doesn’t always take a surgeon for endoscopy.
I assume they have medical suppliers for things like flu vaccine, cortisone injections, and other meds they might need to dispense at a doctor’s office, but outside of a hospital setting. I get IV infusions every 6 weeks, right in the doc’s office…I don’t go to CVS first.
That quote there has been misattributed to me, twice. It was actually incidental’s.
Yes, I didn’t mean to imply that anesthesiologists weren’t doctors, just that the propofol wasn’t administered by my doctors.
There is something really funny about **Irishman **calling my Michael Jackson hypothesis a zebra. If anyone was ever a zebra…
Are you saying that MJ or Irishman was a zebra?
Irishman may have his own eccentricities. But in the saying “when you hear hoofbeats, think horses, not zebras,” MJ is definitely the zebra type.
I’m afraid that when I heard that MJ’s personal physician was present when he arrested I very much thought that this sort of scenario was the most likely.
Personally I think it highlights the rather worrying conflict of interest inherent in being the concierge physician to a very odd, very rich person with addiction issues.
Ah. Yes, that I can agree with.
IAAPharmacy Student, I don’t know of any retail pharmacies that stock propofol normally, but that doesn’t mean we can’t get it. We could order propofol from our regular wholesaler, just like we could any other drug. We would normally be able to have it the next day. In most cases a retail pharmacy uses the same supplier that a hospital pharmacy might use, like Mckesson or Cardinal.
As for the Doctor, he doesn’t need a script to buy medication, as long as it is going to be used in his presence. I worked at a pharmacy that actually ordered and sold drugs regularly to a local doctor. He would tell them what they needed, and we would order it, and give it to his representative when they came to pick it up. This included controlled drugs (including CII’s), and non-scheduled drugs like the shingles vaccine.
Oh, and for the record, propofol isn’t scheduled by the DEA, so it is just a regular legend drug. Doesn’t require any more paperwork then something like Ibuprofen 800mg.