[Sandel]

Significant pain reduction in chronic pain patients after detoxification from high-dose opioids:

http://www.rsds.org/2/library/articl...n_McDonald.pdf

S

[Jimking]

My wife took Ibuprofen for 4 years with her RSD. She began to lose her mind and lost her job and career. She then was put on a cocktail of nerve and narcotic meds by her doctors in which she became much more normal and was much better in dealing with her pain. That was three years ago, that has been my experience.

[Sandel]

I notice too that the symptoms they list are those we get with RSD anyway, so alot of folks would assume they were just getting worse not becomming intollerant to their medicine.. And the detoxification would/should be either temporary or until something else satisfactory could be found to adiquitly controll the pain in this case I would think anyway.

RSD/CRPS is not included in their patient's ailments in this study, and they do imply that the symptoms of hyperalgesia and allodynia are not symptoms they are expecting in their study participants.
I find their thoughts/supositions on hyperalgesia very interesting.
I become intollerant of most drugs before too long it seems, a very few I have been on for the long haul, such as baclofen.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
JimKing, Hi there..

Yes the ibuprophen is not good for the stomach and heart after very long either, not to mention that it is usualy not enouph pain relief for us, though it helps with the achey pain.. it does nothing for the deep bone pain or the various other types of pain thet RSD folk get.. for that we need an assortment of meds for each symptom.. I too have found that is the best way to manage this beast.

Best wishes,
S

[Joe M]

Originally Posted by Sandel

Significant pain reduction in chronic pain patients after detoxification from high-dose opioids:

Sandel,

I'm very glad to hear you were successfully able to get off of the pain meds you were on. Congrats! Personally, I am on a TON of them and there's nothing I can do about this relentless pain from breaking my neck, severing my nerves in the neck & a brain trauma due to an auto-accident.

I'm just wondering if you'd share with me WHAT you were taking and for how long? More importantly, how did they detox you?

You see, I don't think I'll be off my meds anytime soon, but I wonder how painful the detox process was for you. I tried to reduce my meds, bit my bit with my docs help, and it was unsuccessful due to the unrelenting pain. My surgeon said it HAS TO BE at this high dose due to the severity of the injury. I would like to not be tied down by my dependence on pain medication but I don't have no other options now. 1) Live in dire agony or 2) Live on addictive medication. It's just a crappy situation!!

The injury was 3 & 1/2 years ago ... Really, when (I wonder) can the nerve pain stop punishing me and let up. My surgeon said it may be a lifelong struggle (like the brain trauma).

Have you, Sandel, been down this road for years like me? If anyone else has been ... I'd like to hear your comments, too.

Thanks,

Joe

[Debby]

I have been slowly lowering the amount of Morphine I take every 8 hrs over the last 2 months. I think my doctor read that study...............cause he sited the reason that maybe my pain levels would go down by doing this. And maybe the new symptom I have had since last Oct would go away or lessen. It has lessened.............the symptom that is. It was where burning started on my scalp & would eventually encompass my whole body along with bright red blotches the size of my hand & larger. The burning was/is atrocious. I hit it with extra morphine immediately & the burning & redness start to go away. One note hear. I have been on the same dose of morphine since 2005. It has not actually been increased since then at all. Luckily for me I have not grown tolerant to it at all.

I have gone down 25mg every 8 hrs & he has left it up to me if I want to lower it another 15mg over the next 2 months as I see him every 2 months. To be honest I can't tell a whole lot of difference between my pain levels now compared to 3 months ago before lowering them. I am leery of taking it down any further, but I might try it with my bedtime dose next week.

DebbyV

[Sandel]

Originally Posted by Joe M

Sandel,

I'm very glad to hear you were successfully able to get off of the pain meds you were on. Congrats! Personally, I am on a TON of them and there's nothing I can do about this relentless pain from breaking my neck, severing my nerves in the neck & a brain trauma due to an auto-accident.

I'm just wondering if you'd share with me WHAT you were taking and for how long? More importantly, how did they detox you?

You see, I don't think I'll be off my meds anytime soon, but I wonder how painful the detox process was for you. I tried to reduce my meds, bit my bit with my docs help, and it was unsuccessful due to the unrelenting pain. My surgeon said it HAS TO BE at this high dose due to the severity of the injury. I would like to not be tied down by my dependence on pain medication but I don't have no other options now. 1) Live in dire agony or 2) Live on addictive medication. It's just a crappy situation!!

The injury was 3 & 1/2 years ago ... Really, when (I wonder) can the nerve pain stop punishing me and let up. My surgeon said it may be a lifelong struggle (like the brain trauma).

Have you, Sandel, been down this road for years like me? If anyone else has been ... I'd like to hear your comments, too.

Thanks,

Joe

Joe I am very sory you are in this situation bud, I was never on alot of very high doses because of my intollerences of the meds, I used to be in hell, I would get so sick on them.. I would take em anyway cause felt I had to but not full doses cause I got sick alot.. and I was in so much pain my rsd spread.. So finaly they started me on a new treatment that helped bring my pain levels down @ 30% for periods of time.. wow! It was incredible, and it still is every month when I get my infusion again. Subcutanious lidocaine infusions every 3-4 weeks.. they are more for, if more than one area is effected with RSD as it (lidocaine/anesthesia) works systemicly throughout your whole body.

I just weaned off anything heavy I was on at the time my pain was contained, cource it was very hard to not reach for something a little later as the pain levels grew, but it helped knowing it was only temporary and that I get another infusion soon.

Good luck, hope this can help.
~Sadra

[daniella]

Hi. When I went to Cleveland Clinic pain program that was the first thing was to take people off the narcotic or other similar meds. Only meds that were alowed were like neurontin. For me since I was on them a short time I got off them easily. Also when I was on them I was crying from pain still and when I went off them my pain did not increase. For others who has been on them longer they had a ruffer time getting off. Some people I think had to go inpatient for a few days to be monitored. Since then I have seen a few docs who deal with RSD and for me and I am not saying others but for me they felt that long term it woud make my brain process the pain more. I am not sure what the answer is. I do feel everyone has to do what gets them through and is the best for them.

[Imahotep]

Originally Posted by Joe M

Sandel,

I'm very glad to hear you were successfully able to get off of the pain meds you were on. Congrats! Personally, I am on a TON of them and there's nothing I can do about this relentless pain from breaking my neck, severing my nerves in the neck & a brain trauma due to an auto-accident.

I'm just wondering if you'd share with me WHAT you were taking and for how long? More importantly, how did they detox you?

You see, I don't think I'll be off my meds anytime soon, but I wonder how painful the detox process was for you. I tried to reduce my meds, bit my bit with my docs help, and it was unsuccessful due to the unrelenting pain. My surgeon said it HAS TO BE at this high dose due to the severity of the injury. I would like to not be tied down by my dependence on pain medication but I don't have no other options now. 1) Live in dire agony or 2) Live on addictive medication. It's just a crappy situation!!

The injury was 3 & 1/2 years ago ... Really, when (I wonder) can the nerve pain stop punishing me and let up. My surgeon said it may be a lifelong struggle (like the brain trauma).

Have you, Sandel, been down this road for years like me? If anyone else has been ... I'd like to hear your comments, too.

Thanks,

Joe

You don't want to take medication you don't need or isn't helping. With this condition you can end up on a lot of them if you take everything. Talk to your doctor about what helps and what doesn't. Avoid taking more drugs to get rid of side effects. Try to start one medication at a time and change your regimine one thing at a time so you know what the effects are.

It's said that the narcotics are safe enough if you follow doctor's orders. Most of these are probably no tougher to kick than tobacco. I know one person who was taking massive doses of methadone and was able to kick it entirely (with the docs help) in only a few weeks.

Each of us and our disease might be different but one of the bigfgest things for me is avoiding the triggers. Of course they can be unavoidable but try to learn them and to your best to keep them at bay. Distract yourself from the pain.

Good luck.

[Sandel]

Originally Posted by Joe M

Sandel,

I'm very glad to hear you were successfully able to get off of the pain meds you were on. Congrats! Personally, I am on a TON of them and there's nothing I can do about this relentless pain from breaking my neck, severing my nerves in the neck & a brain trauma due to an auto-accident.

I'm just wondering if you'd share with me WHAT you were taking and for how long? More importantly, how did they detox you?

You see, I don't think I'll be off my meds anytime soon, but I wonder how painful the detox process was for you. I tried to reduce my meds, bit my bit with my docs help, and it was unsuccessful due to the unrelenting pain. My surgeon said it HAS TO BE at this high dose due to the severity of the injury. I would like to not be tied down by my dependence on pain medication but I don't have no other options now. 1) Live in dire agony or 2) Live on addictive medication. It's just a crappy situation!!

The injury was 3 & 1/2 years ago ... Really, when (I wonder) can the nerve pain stop punishing me and let up. My surgeon said it may be a lifelong struggle (like the brain trauma).

Have you, Sandel, been down this road for years like me? If anyone else has been ... I'd like to hear your comments, too.

Thanks,

Joe

Hi again Joe.. I think the most important thing is for your pain to be managed before you try detox.. in other words.. I had another pain relief method working for me at the time (being my subcutanious lidocaine infusions), so at least I was mainly dealing with the rebound pain from the morphine at first and my bodys intollerance it helped me as well.

Bob, I just post these research papers to try to be helpful, we are all diffrent and our bodys react diffrently. I do understand that narcotics are helpful for CRPS and some people tollerate them very well, I am glad it is helping you so much my friend and I do not mean to imply that we should not be on narcotics, just that we should be aware of the potentual problems that are there as well..

Peace my friends.
~ Sandra

RSD/CRPS Research and Developements.

[gabbycakes]

Originally Posted by Sandel

Significant pain reduction in chronic pain patients after detoxification from high-dose opioids:

http://www.rsds.org/2/library/articl...n_McDonald.pdf

S

My PM doctor has been telling me this for about 6 years. During this period I have come off all meds. and it is true the pain does change. I would not say it completely goes away but it changes for the better. Am I off everything today, no, but reduced tremendously....I have had surgeries and procedures that require me to take meds. at this times....The least you take the better....

Thanks for the info...

Gabbycakes