We need to speed up our acceptance of the opioid guidelines

A couple of years ago, I inherited a patient who was on both a patch for the powerful painkiller fentanyl and a high dose of oxycodone four times daily — and she didn’t have cancer.

I had 15 minutes with that patient to get her medical history, review her medications, assess her current complaints, and decide whether or not to continue her opioid prescriptions. I had no paper records and a …

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