“CIA are drug smugglers.” – Head of DEA said this too late for Gary Webb

Posted on January 5, 2019 by Pharmaciststeve

Michael Levine’s Triangle of Death, now out there in eBook format!

Amazon Kindle: http://goo.gl/EM7XVg
iTunes Bookstore (for Apple merchandise): https://goo.gl/Lw39vu
Barnes & Noble NOOK: https://goo.gl/SWbM8r
Kobo (Adobe DRM EPUB): https://goo.gl/0gSyvD
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60 Minutes presses for the reality, and Robert C. Bonner, former federal decide and head of the DEA, calls the CIA “drug smugglers.” This video is devoted to all these lives misplaced within the War on Drugs, whereas the CIA betrayed us.

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Deep Cover is now out there on Kindle right here:http://goo.gl/DrfPM
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THE BIG WHITE LIE can also be out there in eBook format on the hyperlinks under:

Amazon Kindle: http://goo.gl/OKpxl
B&N NOOK: http://goo.gl/OEOYy
iBooks (for iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch): http://goo.gl/fVM5i
Kobo (and different Adobe DRM eReaders): http://goo.gl/5T0ft

http://www.michaellevinebooks.com

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What is the real definition of a opiate OD… depends on what your definition of “is”… is

Posted on January 5, 2019 by Pharmaciststeve

Who Is Telling The Truth About Prescription Opioid Deaths? DEA? CDC? Neither?

https://www.acsh.org/news/2018/11/05/who-telling-truth-about-prescription-opioid-deaths-dea-cdc-neither-13569

Controlled Prescription Drugs (CPDs) … are still responsible for the most drug-involved overdose deaths and are the second most commonly abused substance in the United States.”

2018 National Drug Threat Assessment. Drug Enforcement Administration, October 2018.

I just don’t get it. A newly-released 164-page report just issued by the DEA maintains that controlled prescription drugs are killing more Americans than any other type of drug (1); even more than heroin and fentanyl. But if you’ve been keeping up in this area this sounds very strange. Can it really be true that drugs like Vicodin and Percocet are killing more Americans, especially when one report after another lays the blame on illicit fentanyl and its scary analogs? What is going on? Are we seeing more of lying by omission or the use of intentionally misleading statistics, such as we’ve seen from the CDC and its advisors (See: The Opioid Epidemic In 6 Charts Designed To Deceive You)? Is this claim legitimate?

While the quote at the beginning seems clear enough, it is either intentionally deceiving, or unintentionally confusing. Here’s why.

First, given the non-stop barrage of opioid crisis stories, most of which have been dead wrong, many people will automatically assume that “controlled prescription drugs” refers to prescription opioids. It does not. Other classes of drugs are also controlled and they are lumped together with opioids:

“Controlled prescription drugs (CPDs) includes, but is not limited to narcotics (e.g. Vicodin, OxyContin), depressants (e.g. Valium, Xanax), stimulants (e.g. Adderall, Ritalin), and anabolic steroids (e.g. Anadrol, Oxandrin).”

Indeed, if you look carefully enough there is a separate definition for opioid analgesic drugs:

“Opioid analgesic overdose deaths include deaths from natural and semi-synthetics: codeine, morphine, oxycodone, hydrocodone, and methadone.”

This means that:

  • Controlled prescription drugs may be responsible for most drug-related overdose deaths, but since other classes are included in the CPD group we cannot know whether this conclusion applies to opioid analgesics without knowing the contribution of depressants, stimulants, and anabolic steroids.
  • If you believe that this language is reminiscent of what we heard from PROP (2) and the CDC you are not alone.
  • If you believe that this language may be intentionally constructed to convey another message you are not alone.

So, let’s rewrite the quote at the top to make it more accurate:

“Controlled Prescription Drugs (CPDs) … are still responsible for the most drug-involved overdose deaths and are the second most commonly abused substance in the United States, but opioid analgesics may or may not be.”

There are plenty of reasons to suspect that they are not. Let’s start with another statement two paragraphs below the one at the top.

“Illicit fentanyl and other synthetic opioids — primarily sourced from China and Mexico—are now the most lethal category of opioids used in the United States.”

This claim seems to better represent reality. Here are some other reality checks.

Figure 2 clearly shows that medications are responsible for far more deaths than heroin, fentanyl and the other classes listed. Given the tone and content of what appeared before this chart, it is not unreasonable to expect that the public and media will simply assume that opioid analgesics are represented by the purple line.

This is puzzling for a number of reasons. First, what is meant by medications? Opioids? All prescription drugs? It’s neither. But you have to look pretty hard to see why.

Rather than have you strain your eyes I pieced together the bits of relevant information into something that you can actually see. And guess what?

Ain’t that something? The medications, which sure are killing a lot of people as shown in Figure 2, are not opioids, or restricted prescription drugs or even unrestricted drugs. They are ALL drugs. Including OTC (Advil, Aleve) and prescription (indomethacin, diclofenac) non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs). Although estimates of annual deaths from NSAIDs vary widely they are significant: 3,000-16,000 deaths per year.

Were OTC medications included in order to skew the results? The CDC and PROP have used this trick over and over again; it works. I don’t know about the DEA, but feel free to ask Uttam Dhillon, Acting Administrator Drug Enforcement Administration. He signed the report.

Uttam Dhillon, Acting Administrator Drug Enforcement Administration

The language of the report is one thing, but its conclusion seems to fly in the face of everything we have been seeing about overdose deaths. How is it possible that fentanyl is not the drug most responsible for overdose deaths? Especially when we see other data, like this:

Are pills really killing more people than heroin and fentanyl? Source: National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIH)

And this:

Since 2014 heroin and fentanyl combined are responsible for far more overdose deaths than pills.Source: CDC/The Wall Street Journal

Or these, which are only a few, of countless headlines?

Or the fact that the number of opioid analgesic prescriptions has dropped since 2012…

Source: Herald-Dispatch

…While total opioid overdose deaths have soared during that same time:

Source: CDC

I don’t know exactly how the DEA came up with its conclusions but this whole thing just doesn’t smell right. Does anyone really believe that Vicodin is killing more Americans than fentanyl and carfentanil? I sure don’t.

If we are being tricked again, ask yourself who stands to benefit from the DEA claiming that prescription opioids are still the main problem. The DEA is part of the Department of Justice, which is run by Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

“Preliminary data from the CDC shows that drug overdose deaths actually began to decline in late 2017 and opioid prescriptions fell significantly.”

Attorney General Jeff Sessions, October 2018

It would seem that Sessions is trying to take credit for “turning around” the opioid crisis by maintaining that policies which have made opioid prescribing much more difficult have actually saved lives. Here’s the “turning around.” Not especially impressive.

Turning around? Please. Source: CDC

No, that’s a bunch of nonsense. The harder it becomes to get pills, the more people flock to heroin and fentanyl. No matter how the DEA plays funny statistics games, combines drugs into groups that make no sense, or buries inconvenient captions in tiny print under graphs, we are left with 164 pages of sleight-of-hand and spin.

If you don’t believe me, Dr. Jeffrey Singer, writing for the Cato Institute, says pretty much the same thing:

What jumps out of these numbers is the fact that efforts to get doctors to curtail their treatment of pain have not meaningfully reduced the overdose rate. They have just caused non-medical users of opioids to migrate over to more dangerous heroin and fentanyl. Fentanyl and heroin—not prescription opioids—are now the principal drugs behind the gruesome mortality statistics.

Jeffrey Singer, M.D., November 2, 2018

So, is the DEA report little more than a carefully constructed attempt to score cheap political points on the backs of pain patients – the group that is suffering the most from the anti-opioid movement?

Don’t ask me. I don’t do politics. Too painful.

NOTE:

(1) But far fewer than alcohol.

(2) PROP is an acronym for Physicians for Responsible Opioid Prescribing. The group, which consists of a bunch of self-anointed opioid experts played a significant part in putting together the execrable “CDC Guideline for Prescribing Opioids for Chronic Pain — United States, 2016,” which is the basis for new laws and policies which are so bad that they have managed to kill more addicts while at the same time legitimate denying pain the medications they need to exist.

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FDA: file complaints withdrawal symptoms, and other adverse reactions – doctor abruptly changing therapy

Posted on January 4, 2019 by Pharmaciststeve

Dear Steve,
I wanted to pass along something you may want to publish on your page, or anywhere else. Here’s the story: When cdc guidelines first came out, I had an idea – I have insight and much experience with US Rx ethical pharma, FDA, drug labeling and drug safety (and lots of other regulatory other stuff). The only thing I could think to do would be advise patients being forceable tapered or abruptly discontinued from medication to report this to FDA under the Medwatch program, which as you know is an FDA voluntary adverse drug reaction reporting mechanism (by phone or online or through physician)… so I kept posting notices on the many groups I’m in mostly in response to horror stories. My thinking was I know how on top of drug safety and data trends FDA is, and that if they saw an uptick in withdrawal symptoms reported, it would be hard data that can never be altered or erased, and they’d have to act on it, and also knowing that FDA’s authority was usurped by CDC in the guidelines and FDA is NOT a fan…
Not as easy to implement this strategy on an ad hoc FB group level, but it makes sound reason to me. So here is my little blurb- I thought if you wanted, you could share it on your FB group in a pinned post, or however, and share with any other group administrators you may know. Totally up to you but here it is:
(Well here’s FDA reporting link I have to go find the blurb again)

https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/medwatch/index.cfm?action=reporting.home

Here’s the blurb I came up with: Withdrawal symptoms, and other adverse reactions, are considered a serious safety problem with medication, especially when this is happening as a result of a doctor abruptly discontinuing or inappropriately tapering your drug treatment in a way directed against in the medicine’s US FDA approved prescribing information. In the US, you are encouraged to voluntarily report this, and any other problems with medicines, to FDA at 1-800-fda-1088, or using the form provided in the link below. This is one of the only ways that we as chronic pain patients have right now to have these instances documented officially by US government. FDA uses the data to detect trends (potential safety problems with medications) and works to mitigate them.

 

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doctor gets first hand view of American medicine at its worse ?

Posted on January 3, 2019 by Pharmaciststeve

The new president of the California Medical Association was expecting to spend New Year’s at a wedding in Las Vegas.

Instead, David Aizuss, MD, posted on Facebook about his “eye opening” first-hand view of “American medicine at its worst.” (The post is visible only to his Facebook friends and he declined MedPage Today’s request to elaborate, citing ongoing “medical issues.”)

In his post, Aizuss said he was rushed by ambulance to a hospital Monday morning. “I spent hours in the emergency room where I received inadequate treatment of mind boggling pain, was never touched or examined by a physician, was mixed up with another patient and almost inadvertently transferred to another hospital, (and) was scheduled for emergency surgery based on a third patient’s lab work that was confused with mine,” he wrote.

He “finally signed out of the hospital against medical advice so I could obtain care from physicians that I know and trust.” He did not name the hospital.

Aizuss, an ophthalmologist who practices in Calabasas, northwest of Los Angeles, posted his complaint New Year’s Eve, apparently while at the LAX International airport in Los Angeles, where he said he was “just returning from Las Vegas where we were supposed to attend a wedding.”

Dozens of Facebook friends, several apparently also physicians, expressed their shock that the CMA president could receive such poor emergency room response, and some said they were happy he was speaking out about poor quality of hospital care.

“If you get terrible care like this (at least you know the difference) think about the care that Joe Sixpack gets; he doesn’t have the resources to get better care. This system is broken and we need to fix it,” posted one.

Wrote another, “As president of the CMA, your voice can be loud! Don’t be timid and do not be afraid of making enemies. Remember our patients know and respect us when we stand against poor medicine.”

Aizuss ended the post by saying, “Truly an eye-opening experience for the President of the California Medical Association. Happy New Year to all!”

He began his one-year term as CMA president in mid-October, saying he wanted to focus on physician burnout, practice sustainability, and payment. He is also past chairman of the CMA Board of Trustees.

He is a medical staff member at Tarzana Hospital and West Hills Hospital, in Los Angeles County, and serves as an assistant clinical professor of ophthalmology at the UCLA Geffen School of Medicine.

The CMA represents about 43,000 physicians in the state and is the second largest organized medicine group of any state, next to the Texas Medical Association, which represents about 52,000 physicians.

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Opioid overdose deaths plunge 31 percent in Ohio county thanks to free Narcan

Posted on January 3, 2019 by Pharmaciststeve

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/opioid-overdose-deaths-plunge-31-percent-ohio-hamilton-county-free-narcan/

In the midst of what’s considered the nation’s worst public health crisis so far in the 21st century, one Ohio county is dramatically reducing the number of deaths related to opioid overdoses. A new report shows overdose deaths plunged by 31 percent in Hamilton County, which includes Cincinnati. There was also a 42-percent drop in emergency room visits. Health officials credit a new program that gives away the overdose-reversal drug Narcan for free.

One-hundred-fifteen Americans die every day from opioid overdoses. CBS News correspondent Don Dahler and his team went to Hamilton County and spoke to people who are facing the crisis head-on.

“It’s just heartbreaking what’s going on out there, and it’s got to stop… It’s an awful thing for a mom to go through,” Kathie Mead said. She watched her daughter, Amy, struggle with opioid addiction from age 14 to 30.

“Every time my phone would ring, I would think, ‘Is this a coroner’s office calling for me to come and identify her body?'” Mead said.

Mead’s daughter, Amy Parker, even used while pregnant with her daughter, Chloe.

“They finally decided that the right thing for to do and the best thing for her was for me to sign away my parental rights,” Parker said. 

Chloe is one of more than 2.5 million children living with grandparents because of a parent’s addiction.

“It makes me feel sad because—that she wasn’t really around for most of my life. And, well, she missed out on important milestones,” Chloe said.

“It’s hard for me to look at photos of her when she was young because I wasn’t there… when she took her first steps. I wasn’t there when she started school,” Parker said.

Ohio had 4,854 accidental drug overdose deaths last year and 444 of those were in Hamilton County. Tim Ingram, the Hamilton County public health commissioner, said opioid addiction is a “huge problem” in the area.  

“So we started to think about, ‘How are we going to… keep people alive… until they’re ready for treatment?'” Ingram said.

The answer? Narcan, an opioid-reversal drug. It revives the patient within seconds.

Since last October, the Narcan distribution collaborative has handed out more than 37,000 Narcan doses to the public.

“We got this idea… ‘What would happen if we saturated the community, removed the cost, used data to put Narcan out in as many hands as possible?'” Ingram said.

Since the program started, opioid related overdose deaths decreased by 31 percent and emergency runs for overdoses dropped by 37 percent. We saw it first hand when we embedded with a team of first responders in Hamilton County. Last year, they saw at least eight overdose calls a day. This year, it’s about five. And the day we were there: zero.

Dr. Shawn Ryan helped institute the Narcan distribution collaborative. Seventy-five percent of his patients with severe opioid use disorder were once revived with Narcan.

“It’s a potential that almost none of those people would have made it to treatment if they hadn’t had Narcan available,” Ryan said. 

Narcan gave Parker a second chance at life. She has been sober for more than six years and now helps others in recovery.

“I wonder, you know, ‘Why me? Why did I get to go through all of that? Why did I get to survive?’ And I know that it’s because I have a message,” Parker said. “There is hope through this.”

“If I had to go through that to get to this, I’d do it every day,” Mead said, choking up with emotion. “I just can’t tell you how proud—”

“That overdose saved my life,” Parker said.

“Instead of ending it, it started it,” Mead said.

Narcan contains the medicine naloxone, which works by targeting the brain to reverse and block the effects of opioids — so if there are no opioids in your system, it won’t affect you. Narcan is available at any pharmacy without a prescription. 

37,000 doses of Narcan handed out in ONE COUNTY and potentially revived some 120 OD… did not make them clean… getting… staying clean is a long very bumpy road.  How many stories has CBS put on about people suffering from intractable chronic pain that had their medication reduced or eliminated to a point that their life ended with SUICIDE.  The only choice that they had to stop their unrelenting pain ?

Few of you might remember the small southern Indiana Scott County that had a literal EXPLOSION of HIV+ & Heb B&C pts in a matter of a few months… and how then Gov Mike Pence started a free needle exchange program and other things

Now there is a new SHERIFF in town and this former Indiana State Police is now the new Scott County Sheriff and he is declaring Scott a DRUG FREE COUNTY  https://www.wdrb.com/news/new-sheriff-declares-scott-county-a-drug-free-zone/article_e331e4e0-0dff-11e9-aae2-dfb3ec76b672.html

If you live in or visit Scott County, Indiana, the sheriff wants you to know it’s a drug-free area.

Newly elected Sheriff Jerry Goodin said, effective Jan. 1, 2019, Scott County is a drug-free zone.  Scott County is just a about 30 miles from us and Barb has some relatives in that county … it is a very rural and poor county and “my money” is on the substance abusers to prevail..

“This is a big problem for us,” Goodin said. “We have a lot of grandparents that are raising their grandkids.  We are not going to put up with this anymore. It’s over.”

Goodin says he will take a zero-tolerance policy with dealing, manufacturing or possessing any illegal drugs.

The sheriff warns that, if you are contributing to the drug problem in the county, you should move or you will be arrested.

“We’re going to be investigating all of our drug over doses,” he said. “If that person survives to drug over dose we will be charging them with possession, obviously and also attempted murder on that person if we can find out who the dealer is.”

Goodin says he is reorganizing resources to focus specifically on attacking drug users and dealers. He will work with prosecutors to push for harsher penalties for drug offenders. 

“We’re going to be working with the prosecutors office, and we will be working with the judges to make sure we can get some maximum penalties.”

The department of corrections is also starting a new drug rehabilitation program inside the jail, although it’s unclear when it will begin. 

“They’re going to be actually learning life skills,” Goodin said. “They’re going to learn how to beat this addiction they have and we’re going to provide job skills to them. When they get out of jail, they will have an opportunity to break this revolving door cycle.”

Years of prescription drug abuse by residents has led to growing HIV cases.

Health officials have linked the majority of cases to people sharing needles while using the painkiller Opana.

Goodin, a longtime Indiana State Police sergeant, was elected in November. 

 

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When a Doctor Forced Me to Taper Off Pain Medication

Posted on January 3, 2019 by Pharmaciststeve

When a Doctor Forced Me to Taper Off Pain Medication

https://themighty.com/2018/10/forced-taper-pain-medication/?utm_source=ChronicIllness_Page&utm_medium=Facebook

I was with my pain doctor on the same medication for 20 years when the medications that control my chronic pain were stopped without my consent.

On that day in April 2017, I arrived at my doctors office for a routine follow-up when a doctor I had never seen before walked in. He told me he was brought in just to take everyone off their pain medication within one month. Because I broke into tears and begged for an extra month, he gave me one full prescription and began the forced taper the following month.

My worst pain comes from chronic cluster migraines, a back injury with a rupture at T-10, T-11 and my neck is fused. I also have fibromyalgia, chronic kidney stones and severe facet joint degeneration.

The fourth week of August 2018 I was having one of the worst cluster migraines have ever had, and it was on its 10th day. The T-10, T-11 was really hurting and kidney stones had started to pass. I was in horrific pain and considering suicide.

My contract with a new pain doctor requires me to contact the clinic if there is a problem. My son called the clinic to tell them because of the horrific pain he was taking me to the hospital. He was told he could take me, but under no circumstances could they give me any pain medication. My son called three more times; on the last call they told him we must have the doctor’s permission and he had already gone home.

No human should be forced to live in horrific pain. As a person in constant incurable pain I am one of the millions who were forced into a taper or the pain medication was stopped completely. A family pet would be shown mercy and never be forced to live in pain.

I live in unbearable pain 24/7. I’m one of the many people in pain whose doctors have abandoned us and ignored our pleas for help. Many pharmacists profile us based on their perception of our appearance. Some will not even fill prescriptions from cancer patients.

I have disability benefits awarded by my government for intractable pain, yet I suffer discrimination and cannot get treatment for that pain. Until our government admits the epidemic is about street drugs like fentanyl and heroin and stops persecuting people in pain, there will be more and more deaths by overdose from street drugs and more pain patients suffering.

Where do we go from here?

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Tanezumab – FDA Allows Trials To Continue On This Horror Drug

Posted on January 2, 2019 by Pharmaciststeve

Does Pfizer Have A Multibillion-Dollar Replacement For Opioids?

https://www.investors.com/news/technology/pfizer-lilly-tanezumab-opioids-treating-pain/

“In our 2019 preview we said the biggest surprise could be that the safety for Pfizer and Lilly’s tanezumab will be better than expected, and this drug could replace opioids for the treatment of pain,” Cantor Fitzgerald analyst Louise Chen said in a report to clients.

Chen kept her overweight rating and 53 price target on Pfizer stock. On the stock market today, Pfizer stock advanced 1.6% to close at 43.65. Meanwhile, Lilly stock lifted 1.3%, to 115.72.

Combating Opioids In Treating Pain

One estimate suggests that more than 115 people die each day in the U.S. after overdosing on opioids. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates the total economic burden of prescription opioid misuse in the U.S. is $78.5 billion annually.

Pfizer and Lilly’s tanezumab could help ease the opioid crisis, Chen says.

“If we are right, then the peak sales potential of tanezumab could be billions of dollars,” she said. This would “drive upside to modest expectations for the drug.”

Pfizer and Lilly expect to release study results within six months on treating osteoarthritis pain. The results will examine 24 weeks and 56 weeks of treatment. The companies will also release the results of a study in chronic low back pain.

Safety Questions For NGF Inhibitors

But questions persist around nerve growth factor, or NGF, inhibitors like tanezumab. In early tests, the drugs have been connected to abnormal joint damage. Regeneron Pharmaceuticals (REGN) and Teva Pharmaceutical (TEVA) have another NGF called fasinumab.

Earlier this year, Pfizer and Lilly said 1.3% of patients given tanezumab in a 16-week test showed problematic joint damage, known as rapidly progressive osteoarthritis, or RPOA. There were no cases of RPOA in patients who received the placebo.

Investors expect the upcoming results to be “similar to or worse” than prior data, Cantor Fitzgerald’s Chen said.

“However, physicians we interviewed were impressed by that data, and did not believe the RPOA imbalance would impact their desire to prescribe tanezumab, if it is approved,” she said.

Tanezumab – FDA Allows Trials To Continue On This Horror Drug

Tanezumab was going to be Pfizer’s next cash cow. It was one of a new class of anti-nerve growth factor (anti-NGF) drugs, which blocks a key protein that helps deliver your body’s pain signals.

So when people with severe joint pain enrolled for tanezumab trials, they were desperately searching for relief. Even though the drug was still in its experimental phase, it was supposed to be safe and promised to melt away even the most agonizing joint pain.

However, as soon as the tanezumab trials began the horror show also started… people were left with permanent joint damage and others were scrambled into surgery for new knees, hips and shoulders.

Researchers reported fractures and total joint collapse among participants and even the American Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said it looked more like participants were developing “rapidly progressive arthritis” causing “death of bone tissue due to a lack of blood.”

A second season of the tanezumab horror show

Finally, in 2012, after tanezumab unleashed endless suffering onto patients the FDA was forced to bring all trials for anti-NGF drugs to an immediate halt. In the aftermath a top researcher testified that it would be unethical to ever resume human testing of tanezumab again.

As we all know, ethics are not Big Pharma’s strongest characteristic… and now, a mere three years after the first tanezumab horror season, Pfizer is picking up right where it left off ready for a tanezumab sequel along with a $2 billion investment from its new partner, the pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly.

And it looks like these two powerful drug companies are happy to spend – and say – anything to unleash this risky drug on a new round of victims.

The FDA recently announced that it would allow tanezumab trials to resume after new “nonclinical” data (as in research that did not come from the previous, disastrous trials) showed tanezumab “could be safe”.

Now, when it comes to pharmaceutical drugs, those three words should be enough to send the red flags flying and the alarm bells ringing.

But as a result of the fancy footwork Pfizer and Eli Lilly are using to explain away the bone and joint damage the drug has done in previous trials, joint pain sufferers are in for a second round of tanezumab hell.

See, the researchers claim that tanezumab was so effective in previous trials and took away so much pain that the participants using it weren’t “signalled” that they were overusing their fragile bones.

That’s right, blame the participants!

It’s an excuse that’s impossible to believe – especially because in one trial, a full third of tanezumab patients didn’t experience any clinically significant pain relief at all.

Frankly, tanezumab is a blunder drug, not a wonder drug.

But the FDA swallowed the explanation hook, line and sinker, and not before long tanezumab will be sent to the FDA for final approval.

Unfortunately, we know that people will be tricked into participating in new tanezumab trials, lured by the same empty promises that were made just three years ago. It’s doubtful they’ll be warned before they sign away their rights – and their joints – on the dotted line.

We can’t stop tanezumab from hitting the market, but we can let you know when it gets approved and under what brand names it will be sold so that you can be sure to avoid this drug at all costs.

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Veterans protest the gutting of West L.A. PTSD therapy groups

Posted on January 2, 2019 by Pharmaciststeve

Veterans protest the gutting of West L.A. PTSD therapy groups

https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ptsd-group-shutdown-20181229-story.html

“It is important that we maintain a host of treatment options for our veterans suffering from PTSD,” he said.

The secretary of Veterans Affairs, Robert Wilkie, responded that the group therapy program was being “rebranded,” not ended. But he also questioned the effectiveness of group therapy for veterans with PTSD.

“Despite the popularity and long history of support groups as routine care for veterans with PTSD and trauma exposure, there is no strong evidence that this modality is an effective treatment,” Wilkie said in a letter to Lieu.

The outcry comes at a difficult moment for the veterans agency, which is experimenting with privatizing mental healthcare while also grappling with staffing shortages and a suicide crisis — 20 former service members a day take their own lives.

Several former clinicians have complained to the VA about an exodus of as many as 50 psychologists and psychiatrists from the Greater Los Angeles VA Health Care System, which includes the Sepulveda and West L.A. campuses.

The VA says PTSD affects 8% of veterans. The agency initially relied on medication to treat the condition, but now is turning to short-term, evidence-based therapies, including cognitive processing, prolonged exposure and eye movement desensitization and reprocessing.

Cognitive processing helps veterans recast negative thoughts about their trauma. Prolonged exposure guides veterans into reliving traumatic events to diminish their fear and anguish, and eye movement desensitization and reprocessing helps veterans recall their trauma while focusing on external motion or sound.

Each therapy course generally runs for three months. Martin said VA officials made it clear they like evidence-based treatment because it’s short and saves money. VA leaders called the therapy groups “social clubs” and said veterans who need more support should take each other’s phone numbers, Martin said.

Evidence-based therapies can be tough on veterans, who may have spent years trying to forget the very memories that the sessions dredge up. In his letter, Lieu said only 50% to 60% of veterans complete evidence-based therapies.

Peter Erdos, 35, said he tried medication and evidence-based therapies with minimal success after his return from Iraq.

“Medication is something that the VA was OK with me being on for the rest of my life,” said Erdos, a member of the combat veterans group. “Coming back in my 20s and hearing that was just soul-crushing. What worked for me was camaraderie with the guys.”

Research on the effectiveness of group therapy to treat combat veterans with PTSD is inconclusive. Carl Castro, director of USC’s Center for Innovation and Research on Veterans & Military Families, said the VA should have studied the groups before squeezing them out.

“The VA has gobs of money to do research,” Castro said. “It was a unilateral decision and goes against patient-centered therapy.”

“For a lot of veterans involved in group therapy, just the fact they’re engaging in it is therapeutic for them,” said Paul Brown, adjutant of the American Legion, Department of California. “If it makes a difference in even one veteran’s life, we’re going to push to have it continued.“

Members of the PTSD combat support group have continued meeting in a room they rent at a Westside senior center. Martin is volunteering to facilitate.

Before a gathering last month, a dozen veterans described the group as a lifeline. The men are black and white, former officers and draftees, and at least one attended West Point. Some spent years battling alcoholism or substance abuse. Some worked as lawyers, company executives or architects.

Several said they had PTSD symptoms — anger, anxiety, depression — for decades before seeking treatment.

“It only took me 47 years,” said Steven Goldstein, 71, a U.S. Army infantry veteran who served in Vietnam. “I had no joy in my life.”

Randy Kline said he was drafted out of Inglewood in 1967 “to participate in crimes against humanity“ — a moral injury that experts increasingly consider to be as damaging as a gunshot wound or other combat trauma.
Veterans Peter Erdos, from left, Dov Simens and Steven Goldstein walk outside Building 256 at the West Los Angeles Healthcare Center. Veterans accuse the VA of dismantling psychological services and PTSD groups at the Greater L.A. campuses.
Veterans Peter Erdos, from left, Dov Simens and Steven Goldstein walk outside Building 256 at the West Los Angeles Healthcare Center. Veterans accuse the VA of dismantling psychological services and PTSD groups at the Greater L.A. campuses. (Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)

Arnold Hudson said that as a black man from South Los Angeles, he saw no future as a convicted draft dodger. So he reluctantly answered the call to Vietnam, where he saw his friend “incinerated before my eyes.”

AHudson said the group gave him his life back after years of drug addiction.

“I’m 69 years old and I lost a whole lot of life,” he said. “When they announced we were disbanding I thought, why in the world is the government who vowed to take care of us cutting us off at the knees?”

The veterans said they want to return to the VA campus, where the next person home from Afghanistan or Iraq could wander in and find the support that only comes from shared experience.

“We’re a band of brothers. We have a duty to all vets,” Simens said. “We’re just asking for a 400- to 500-square-foot room, for two hours, once a week.”

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The five most addictive substances in the world – two don’t need a Rx

Posted on January 2, 2019 by Pharmaciststeve

The five most addictive substances in the world

https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/02/health/most-addictive-substances-partner/index.html

What are the most addictive drugs? This question seems simple, but the answer depends on whom you ask.

From the points of view of different researchers, the potential for a drug to be addictive can be judged in terms of the harm it causes, the street value of the drug, the extent to which the drug activates the brain’s dopamine system, how pleasurable people report the drug to be, the degree to which the drug causes withdrawal symptoms, and how easily a person trying the drug will become hooked.
There are other facets to measuring the addictive potential of a drug, too, and there are even researchers who argue that no drug is always addictive. Given the varied view of researchers, then, one way of ranking addictive drugs is to ask expert panels.
In 2007, David Nutt and his colleagues asked addiction experts to do exactly that — with some interesting findings.

1. Heroin

Opioids and overdoses: 4 things to know

Opioids and overdoses: 4 things to know
Nutt et al.’s experts ranked heroin as the most addictive drug, giving it a score of 3 out of a maximum score of 3. Heroin is an opiate that causes the level of dopamine in the brain’s reward system to increase by up to 200% in experimental animals. In addition to being arguably the most addictive drug, heroin is dangerous, too, because the dose that can cause death is only five times greater than the dose required for a high.
Snorted, injected or smoked? It can affect a drug’s addictiveness
Heroin also has been rated as the second most harmful drug in terms of damage to both users and to society. The market for illegal opiates, including heroin, was estimated to be $68 billion worldwide in 2009.

2. Cocaine

Cocaine's effects: Highs and harms

Cocaine’s effects: Highs and harms
Cocaine directly interferes with the brain’s use of dopamine to convey messages from one neuron to another. In essence, cocaine prevents neurons from turning the dopamine signal off, resulting in an abnormal activation of the brain’s reward pathways. In experiments on animals, cocaine caused dopamine levels to rise more than three times the normal level. It is estimated that between 14 million and 20 million people worldwide use cocaine and that in 2009 the cocaine market was worth about $75 billion.
Blocking rewards: How the immune system could help treat cocaine addiction
Crack cocaine has been ranked by experts as being the third most damaging drug and powdered cocaine, which causes a milder high, as the fifth most damaging. About 21% of people who try cocaine will become dependent on it at sometime in their life. Cocaine is similar to other addictive stimulants, such as methamphetamine — which is becoming more of a problem as it becomes more widely available — and amphetamine.

3. Nicotine

Nicotine in e-cigs, tobacco linked to heart disease

Nicotine in e-cigs, tobacco linked to heart disease
Nicotine is the main addictive ingredient of tobacco. When somebody smokes a cigarette, nicotine is rapidly absorbed by the lungs and delivered to the brain. Nutt et al’s expert panels rated nicotine (tobacco) as the third most addictive substance.
More than two-thirds of Americans who tried smoking reported becoming dependent during their life. In 2002 the WHO estimated there were more than 1 billion smokers and it has been estimated that tobacco will kill more than 8 million people annually by 2030. Laboratory animals have the good sense not to smoke. However, rats will press a button to receive nicotine directly into their bloodstream — and this causes dopamine levels in the brain’s reward system to rise by about 25% to 40%.
What is dopamine, and is it to blame for our addictions?

4. Barbiturates (“downers”)

Barbiturates — also known as blue bullets, gorillas, nembies, barbs and pink ladies — are a class of drugs that were initially used to treat anxiety and to induce sleep. They interfere with chemical signalling in the brain, the effect of which is to shut down various brain regions. At low doses, barbiturates cause euphoria, but at higher doses they can be lethal because they suppress breathing. Barbiturate dependence was common when the drugs were easily available by prescription, but this has declined dramatically as other drugs have replaced them. This highlights the role that the context plays in addiction: if an addictive drug is not widely available, it can do little harm. Nutt et al’s expert panels rated barbiturates as the fourth most addictive substance.

5. Alcohol

Although legal in the US and UK, alcohol was scored by Nutt et al.’s experts 1.9 out of a maximum of 3. Alcohol has many effects on the brain, but in laboratory experiments on animals it increased dopamine levels in the brain’s reward system by 40% to 360% — and the more the animals drank the more dopamine levels increased.
No amount of alcohol is good for your overall health, global study says

No amount of alcohol is good for your overall health, global study says
Some 22% of people who have taken a drink will develop dependence on alcohol at some point during their life. The WHO has estimated that 2 billion people used alcohol in 2002 and more than 3 million people died in 2012 due to damage to the body caused by drinking. Alcohol has been ranked as the most damaging drug by other experts, too.

Eric Bowman is a lecturer in psychology and neuroscience at the University of St. Andrews and has received funding from the UK Medical Research Council.

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Is this how the CDC opiate guidelines are causing many pts to be living in a torturous level of pain ?

Posted on January 2, 2019 by Pharmaciststeve

Thank you! Thank you! Brenda Sharp so much for sharing your pain with us and for spreading awareness for Trigeminal Neuralgia and Facial Pain Disorders! This is the first video that I’m uploading across social media sites as well as domestic and international media channels that will allow uploads. Thank you for helping me to step out of the box with awareness in a different avenue by exploring awareness through videos. For starters, it’s on Instagram, Youtube, GooglePlus, Twitter and TNnME! Thank you!

Filed under: General Problems | 4 Comments »

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