OK< so I stole this image and I have this title to increase my page views but really, that is what this minor blog is all about. My Electronic medical record system , despite being in a very underpopulated isolated little town, has many of the capabilities of the one I used in Colorado. That lends itself to a bit of analysis of how I practice differently in New Zealand than I do in the USA. I can see all my prescribing habits, what prescriptions I write for diabetes or hypertension or , most curiously , for pain control.
Now one might think that because we work with a population that works under very difficult situations , such as driving heavy equipment around a giant pit mine on the top of a mountain in extreme weather, -------------------------------------------------------------or maybe
spending day in and day out working with livestock such as sheep and dairy cattle, that I would have to be treating these poor folk with lots of pain meds. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
No sirree! Americans take 136 million prescriptions of vicodin a year. We account for 5 % of the population and take 80% of the prescription narcotics. I reviewed my prescribing last month, for a full months worth of patient encounters, maybe 400 or so people, I prescribed narcotic pain meds 16 times. And that includes tramadol for 9 prescriptions which in the US doesn't even count. So 7 prescriptions of real opiates. And 4 of those were for codeine, which an ER doctor in the states would not dream of prescribing for pain due to its " low Potency". All but one of the prescriptions was to cancer patients. I shudder to think of what I have prescribed at home in a month to all those with "unrelenting back pain" patients who need their oxycontin. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My diagnosis: Americans are wimps and doctors have bought into it and created a massive public health problem. We see pain like a housecat that when it rubs softly up against our leg we need to pop a percocet. And if it dares to scratch us we are on fentanyl patches for years. I fear I might be a very unpopular doctor when I return to the states with my Nancy Reagan mantra, Just say No!
And by the way, Michelle would like you to get out and exercise and stop eating all that sugar crap with your vicodin.
OK< so I stole this image and I have this title to increase my page views but really, that is what this minor blog is all about. My Electronic medical record system , despite being in a very underpopulated isolated little town, has many of the capabilities of the one I used in Colorado. That lends itself to a bit of analysis of how I practice differently in New Zealand than I do in the USA. I can see all my prescribing habits, what prescriptions I write for diabetes or hypertension or , most curiously , for pain control.
Now one might think that because we work with a population that works under very difficult situations , such as driving heavy equipment around a giant pit mine on the top of a mountain in extreme weather, -------------------------------------------------------------or maybe
spending day in and day out working with livestock such as sheep and dairy cattle, that I would have to be treating these poor folk with lots of pain meds. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
No sirree! Americans take 136 million prescriptions of vicodin a year. We account for 5 % of the population and take 80% of the prescription narcotics. I reviewed my prescribing last month, for a full months worth of patient encounters, maybe 400 or so people, I prescribed narcotic pain meds 16 times. And that includes tramadol for 9 prescriptions which in the US doesn't even count. So 7 prescriptions of real opiates. And 4 of those were for codeine, which an ER doctor in the states would not dream of prescribing for pain due to its " low Potency". All but one of the prescriptions was to cancer patients. I shudder to think of what I have prescribed at home in a month to all those with "unrelenting back pain" patients who need their oxycontin. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My diagnosis: Americans are wimps and doctors have bought into it and created a massive public health problem. We see pain like a housecat that when it rubs softly up against our leg we need to pop a percocet. And if it dares to scratch us we are on fentanyl patches for years. I fear I might be a very unpopular doctor when I return to the states with my Nancy Reagan mantra, Just say No!
And by the way, Michelle would like you to get out and exercise and stop eating all that sugar crap with your vicodin.
You are cracking me up. Yes, it is sad. We healthcare providers need to practice having the difficult conversations that we have not been having for years ... decades, actually.
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