Everyone seems to have an opinion on the use of narcotics for chronic pain. With the scale of prescription drug abuse in Kentucky, most families are aware of someone who has been affected by this epidemic.
Pain medicines undoubtedly work very well for acute (recent onset) pain. Narcotics also help enormously in end of life pain. We see patients who have chronic pain usually from their back or neck ant they want to feel better. What we must ask is "do narcotics help in the long term in back and neck pain?" Surprisingly, the answer is “No”.  There are no good quality research studies to support their use.   In fact, several studies show that patients do worse long term on narcotics. In fact, if narcotics pain killers were discovered today, there would be insufficient evidence to allow their approval for chronic pain other than end of life \ cancer pain!                                                                                                        
Here, we present some interesting facts about pain and narcotics. Not everyone will agree with our conclusions and there are good physicians who continue to use narcotics long term.
As a patient, you need to make good choices based upon medical research that shows what is the best, safest treatment for you.