Its time for my weekly pain/medication question, so here it goes. As some of you know, I broke my back years ago. I had three back surgeries and suffer from failed back surgery syndrome. In short I have chronic pain that is managed with morphine and percocet. I am on these meds around the clock and currently they are working like they should, although my tolerance grows with each passing year.
Because I don’t have enough pain in my life I recently got diagnosed with tennis elbow (weird since I don’t play tennis :dubious:). It is in my left arm and is quite irritating. Not as painful as my back, but painful enough. What I don’t understand is it still hurts despite the morphine and percocet. What gives? The two opioids I am taking are supposed to be fairly powerful pain killers yet neither seem to even make a dent in my arm pain. Why is that? And why do I feel any new pain at all, why dont the meds keep me from feeling new pain?
My doctor didn’t seen too concerned with the tennis elbow, telling me most cases resolve on their own in A few months. Unfortunately I am left handed, so it is constantly irritated.
Oh, I know that YANAD and am not looking for medical advice, rather how pain meds work.
Opioids don’t really take away the root cause of pain so much as they make you care less about it. And if you take them with any regularity you are aware that their effect is blunted over time in many patients.
I’m not sure why you expect a lateral epicondylitis to be either more or less responsive to narcotics than any other pain. I certainly would not recommend narcotics for this condition for more than a few days. It’s very poorly understood, and why various therapeutic approaches–including surgery and platelet-rich plasma–work is even less well understood.
Thanks for the response. I didn’t expect that the opioids would have any effect in repairing or curing the tennis elbow, but I would have thought that they would have dulled or eliminated the pain and discomfort. The meds (although I am not taking them for this condition) seem to have zero effects on the arm pain. Or the arm pain is much worse than I am feeling and they are working on it.
This isn’t a direct response to the OP but as far as the tennis elbow; get one of those cheap $10-$15 “tennis elbow” arm bands that you wrap around your upper forearm. Those things really work great at alleviating the pain and other symptoms if you are consistent with it’s use. I have had some vicious bouts of tennis elbow myself and I rely on these bands. They are available at most large-scale grocery stores and some pharmacies.
A semi anecdotal thing for the OP - obbn, I am not sure how many opioids you take but I take loads every day too, from my reading of [Nov2010.pdf"]this conversion chart](http://www.wales.nhs.uk/sites3/Documents/814/OpiateConversionDoses[Final) I take the equivilant of 1333 mg of morphine a day (i.e. more than a gram). Admittedly, this prescription is mostly for opioid dependence, but it is also for pain as well.
Even with that prescription,I take a moderate dose of asprin - commonly considered a painkiller weaker than paracetamol/acetaminophen (which does nothign for me) every day as well, and I find it to be effective in a way that the opioids are not.
Because they fight pain in different ways, this is not surprising tbh. You may even find that a TENS machine helps. Or even acuptuncture!
By the way, regarding acupuncture - obviously the theory behind it is total crap. However it has been found that just sticking needles in you in more or less any old place (not bothering about the chi lines or whatever it is that acupuncture usually wants the needles in) does seem to work better than placebo… might be worth checking out for that reason. Not that I’ve had it myself, or at least not for therapeutic reasons (I had it done at a skeptic society meeting believe it or not - and no it didn’t do anything, but I wasn’t asking for it to).
This is exactly what I was going to say. Very cheap and instantly effective. FWIW, my tendinitis cleared up when I gave up using the mouse on my computer.
Nope, I have never had any type of mental effects from any of the pain killers. The only side effect I really seem to notice is the lethargy that is overwhelming at times. So much so that my doctor had me on amphetamine so I can stay awake during the day and be somewhat productive. I hate the damn drugs, I wish there was another way to fix the problem.