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The Similarities of Heroin and Pain Killer Addiction

2011/02/20, 4:22 AM

In 2006, a National Survey revealed that almost half of the American public knows a friend or family member who has a pain killer addiction. What is worse about this news is that most citizens are not aware that pain killer abuse is just as bad as heroin addiction.


This ignorance of the public is quite alarming and underlines the danger posed by the rising incidence of pain killer addiction. In order to shed light on the similarities of heroin addiction and pain killer addiction, here are some facts about them.


Heroin is actually an opioid compound obtained from morphine and as you may know, morphine is derived from the opium poppy plant. This opioid compound acts the same way as endorphins, a natural hormone manufactured by the body, which creates a feeling of happiness and well-being.


In the United States, the manufacture, possession and sale of heroin is considered to be illegal. In the UK, however, heroin is prescribed legally under the generic name of diamorphine.


The similarity of heroin addiction to pain killer addiction lies basically on the opiates contained in these substances. Because opiates are considered to be addictive substances, the misuse and abuse of pain killers very often leads to addiction.


The only thing worse about opiate addiction is that most people do not realize their substance abuse problem until it is too late. Basically, individuals who succumb to opiate addiction give many different reasons.


Recreational use is just one of the reasons. As mentioned earlier, the opiates contained in both heroin and pain killers can create an intense feeling of euphoria. Unfortunately, this feeling diminishes as the level of tolerance increases.


People who take opiates usually develop their addiction quickly. Withdrawal symptoms may develop from heroin use after three days while withdrawal symptoms from pain killers can be more intense, but take a little longer to start.


Another reasons is as a pain reliever. As a pain reliever, both heroin and pain killers can be effective. Of course, you can expect heroin to have higher amounts of morphine.


Some opiates do not even create a feeling of euphoria but only act as analgesics. The start of opiate addiction may even be psychological.


Individuals thought that by taking their pain killers they can have a better day or become less stressed. Such careless use of these the drug may come with a high price.


It is quite saddening that people do not realize how similar heroin and pills containing opium are. Both substances will lead you to dependence, tolerance and withdrawal stages.


Withdrawal symptoms for these two addictions may appear at different time intervals but they are basically the same. They both include vomiting, shaking, stomach pain, depression, suicidal thoughts, horrible cramps, aching bones, restlessness, the inability to sleep for days and sometimes weeks, runny nose, loss of appetite and sweating to name the worst of the symptoms.


The American public should be aware of the dangers of the opiate class of drugs from the start. What most people don’t know is that a pain killer addiction can and will often lead to a heroin addiction.


Pretty much anyone that you ask that uses heroin will tell you that they NEVER thought that they would even look at heroin, let alone use it. Of course people who don’t use heroin say the same thing, they will never in a million years touch the stuff.


But the disease of addiction can hit you out of no where. It can be as simple as hurting your back. You would then get prescribed a pain killer by your doctor.


Before you know it you are addicted to them, and you have no idea how hard the addiction is to kick. When your doctor stops prescribing you the pills and you feel the effects of withdrawal, which is hell, anything is a possibility. Most people will start buying pain killers illegally.


They then realize how expensive the pills are, and they realize how much cheaper heroin is. It’s easy to say this would never happen to you, but when those withdrawal symptoms hit you, it will be a whole different story.


So it is very important that you are educated on the dependency of opiates. If you get prescribed pain killers from your doctor, use them as directed, and even then use them with caution.


If you are on the verge of using pain killers recreationally, be even more careful, because you have no idea what your recreational use can quickly turn into. Well, hopefully after reading this article, now you do realize the dangers.


I hope you enjoyed this article, and please take all of the information and advice I gave you seriously. I have experience with this powerful drug, and it is nothing to play around with.


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Painkiller Addiction

2010/12/31, 8:22 PM
Bertil Hjert asked:




Addiction to painkiller is a common problem, especially these days. According to a study, above two million Americans every year take painkillers illegally.

This is also confirmed by the National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (NHSDA) in 2002. According to a recent research, people also try to look for treatment for this addiction more than for addiction to heroin. Shocking! This is due to the increasing numbers of injury, accident & illness that ends up in chronic pain & its treatment conducted by prescription narcotics. With time, frequent use of this drug can actually result in addiction.

The addiction to pain killer starts when initial dose of pain killer becomes inadequate to ease pain. Here, higher doses are prescribed. Once this cycle begins, a biological process is initiated where the body gets physically addicted to the substances used to ease pain. This indicates that it is essential to maintain a base level of the drug inside the system 24×7 in order to stay away from destructive withdrawal symptoms accompanied by the pain for which the pain killer was prescribed.

Here, the patient has to deal with the destructive addiction to pain killers in addiction to severe pain that he is suffering from.

If you want to get help for an addiction to painkillers, it is important to treat both the pain as well as the addiction simultaneously. Experts in this field have proved that withdrawal from pain killers can be lethal if not taken care of by a health care practitioner in a gradual & controlled way. In earlier days, doctors used methadone to help withdrawal as its effects on the body are less dramatic as compared to opiates. However, this method of cure resulted in replacement of one dependency with the other.

Today, scientists have come up with Buprenorphine. It is a miracle drug that’s used to treat pain killer addiction. The drug works towards providing total withdrawal from all types of prescription drug use without the need to replace the old addiction to the newer one. This treatment is widely used today. Buprenorphine is an opiate derivative. It is similar to other opiates in a way that it suppresses the withdrawal symptoms of body as well as the craving for pain killers.

However, the drug is quite different in its chemical makeup in a way that it helps in manageable & complete detox.

Addiction to prescription painkillers is a disease. This practice has become very common these days all across the globe. Most physicians prescribe painkillers such as Vicodin, Norco, Oxycontin & Hydrocodone to treat pain. However, most patients tend to continue these medicines & become physically & emotionally dependant on the drug. The dependence of these drugs often results in symptoms of withdrawal.

Once you get to know that you have become dependant on a certain painkiller, you must seek a medical attention immediately or consult a healthcare practitioner to avoid withdrawal symptoms. Most patients who get addicted to narcotic painkillers are suggested a detoxification program.

One requires taking special care in following the instructions provided by a medical practitioner carefully. The treatment should be considered & followed seriously.

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Risks of Prescription Drug Addiction and Death Should Be More Prominent on Painkiller Labels

2010/07/10, 10:31 AM
Rod MacTaggart asked:




On August 18, 2006, only eighteen years old and three days away from her first day in college, Emily Jackson swallowed a single OxyContin tablet, and soon thereafter died. Emily is only one of hundreds of Americans, and thousands world-wide, who have lost their lives to powerful heroin-like prescription painkillers, unaware of the devastating potential for harm from such drugs, dangers that range from prescription drug addiction to permanent injury to death.

Should we blame Emily Jackson for the accident? Certainly not. A close relative provided the pill from their own legitimate prescription. And after 3 years battling cancer and the pain of multiple surgeries, Emily was steeped in the standard medical practice that prescribes a pill for everything and anything.

Blame the relative? Certainly not as well. The relative was not some pusher trying to make a new customer by creating a prescription drug addiction. There was no way the relative could have known such a tragedy was possible.

The responsibility for Emily’s tragic death lies with a system that continues to give the edge to profits rather than patient safety.

First in this scenario of guilt is the immensely wealthy Big Pharma, an industry driven more by stock values than by ensuring patient safety, or ensuring that risks are known by everyone who should know — physicians, patients and drug regulators.

In the case of OxyContin, corporate greed over patient safety was demonstrably proven recently when the drug’s maker, Purdue Pharma, was fined $634 million for lying about the drug’s power to bring about dependence, which has left a plague of prescription drug addiction, abuse, and ruined lives in its path.

Equally culpable is the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which for years has steadfastly refused to take effective action on two vital points:

1. INDICATIONS FOR USE: The FDA has been urged by patient activist groups, elected officials and members of the medical profession to limit the indications for prescribing OxyContin, Palladone, and similar deadly painkillers from “moderate-to-severe” chronic pain to “severe only” — and only from clinically documented tissue disease.

2. LABELING: The FDA has been also been urged to insist that labels clearly and strongly spell out the real risks of heroin-like painkillers, including prescription drug addiction, permanent injury, or death from even a single dose. The labels still do not make this clear.

Law enforcement and prescription drug detox and rehabilitation centers across the country are on the front lines of the prescription drug addiction war. A baker’s dozen of heroin- and morphine-like painkillers has, in the past decade and a half, become an epidemic in America, and there is no sign of a letup. Statistically, more people are falling prey to prescription drug addiction or dying from prescription drugs than all illicit street drugs combined.

Ellen and Peter Jackson, Emily’s parents, told an FDA panel not long ago that the agency should not approve any new form of OxyContin. They presented statistics showing how OxyContin has led to numerous deaths.

“My daughter is one of those statistics,” Peter Jackson said, “and I am asking you not to turn your back on her.”

Perhaps the Jackson’s weren’t whistling in the wind. When Purdue presented a new formulation for OxyContin for FDA approval recently, claiming it was less prone to causing prescription drug addiction and injury, the agency refused the application, calling for more real science and less rhetoric from the drug maker.

Meanwhile, it is statistically probable that many of the thousands of Americans still using heroin-like painkillers will suffer from prescription drug addiction, and require medical drug detox to begin recovery — provided they don’t die first.

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