Essay Example on Prescription Opioids and Their Unexpected Effects: A Reality Check

Introduction

Pharmaceutical companies argued that the prescription of opioids on patients would not have any side effects on the patients that they were used on. Therefore, the use of opioids on patients experiencing mild and extreme pains was widely accepted and used by the medical practitioners in larger numbers. With the increased prescription of opioids, there arose the diversion and misuse of the prescriptions, since the previously-made assurance that the opioids would not lead to addiction was not fulfilled.

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Facts from the Opioids Crisis

As of 2017, the opioids crisis had affected American society so much that at least 47,000 Americans had died from the complications related to the scourge. Opioids were abused in different forms ranging from prescription opioids, heroin, fentanyl that had been illicitly manufactured, which resulted in a powerfully synthesized variation of the opiates. Additionally, an estimated 1.7 million people suffered from the effects of addiction from the prescription opioids and the disorders associated with the overdose of the use of prescription and non-prescription opioids.

To deal with the opioids crisis, the US department of health has come up with major steps to help in the process of recovery from the damage that the addiction has had on society thus far. First, the department has undertaken serious steps towards facilitating the treatment of the victims of the crisis. Therefore, there have been concerted efforts towards helping the victims recover from the effects that they may have experienced from the use of the prescription and non-prescription opioids secondly, the department has undertaken steps towards promoting the use of drugs that will reverse the effects of the drugs that the victims may have gotten in the course of their addiction. It is therefore pertinent that the department advocates for drugs that will substitute the opioids and the effects that they bring to the victims.

Additionally, the department has continued their surveillance of the health issue that the society faces as a result of the addiction to the opioids that the Americans have been addicted to, thus providing them with further understanding on the crisis, its causes, the effects and the preventive measures that can be put in place to avoid future occurrences of the problem. Therefore, it is through this point that the department has been able to address the social aspects of the crisis and how the medical aspects of the issue can be traced to its effects. More importantly, the department has continued to engage in cutting-edge research to help them in developing other methods of pain management, so that the use of opioids in the field can be successfully eradicated due to the addiction it causes upon its use.

What is something you learned from this module?

Through the research conducted by the department, other means of pain management other than the use of opioids will be important in eradicating the need for the synthesis and production of the opioids in the society, and therefore reduce the risk of such incidences in the society.

How will you change your practice?

Additionally, the department has undertaken continuous programs into addressing the issue of abuse of opioids by setting out into the society to address the abuse issue by teaching young people on the effects of the abuse of opioids and offering ways through which they can resist the urge to start using the drugs, hence reducing the possibility of the youth joining into the behavior. The department has also undertaken programs that will help the community members to engage in activities that will help in overcoming the effects of the addictions.