Pain management currently remains one of the most complicated research questions due to the fact that the peculiarities of its proper control patterns are not available to the practitioners. The issue becomes especially significant in terms of research, considering the fact that most cases of severe and chronic pains are treated with opioids prescriptions. Hence, one of the recent qualitative studies conducted by Manhapra et al. (2018) is focused on the issue of identifying the pattern of pain management not resulting in full-scale opioid addiction. The primary question stated by the researchers was whether the clinicians had an opportunity to follow a specific guideline for pain management, controlling the amount of medication used.
The research method used presupposed compiling an exhaustive commentary using the relevant federal guidelines on opioid prescription. One of the major sources used was the CDC guideline presented by Dowel et al. (2016). The following guidelines were used in the context of contrastive analysis, as the researchers used the empirical data of pain management integrating the actual stories of patients dealing with the issue. The results of the research indicated that patients with long-term exposure to opioid medication were likely to have a condition known as Complex Persistence Dependence (Manhapra et al., 2018). Thus, to address the issue of the connection between opioid addiction and pain control, practitioners should reconsider the approach to chronic pain treatment by treating patients with a high level of dependence on opioids. According to the researchers, such a solution was not found yet, so healthcare authorities were to reconsider the problem prior to tapering the patients off opioid medication (Manhapra et al., 2018). The implications of the study suggested the future integration of the results into research concerning pain management among patients with Complex Persistence Dependence.
References
Dowell, D., Haegerich, T. M., & Chou, R. (2016). CDC guideline for prescribing opioids for chronic pain—the United States, 2016. JAMA, 315(15), 1624-1645. Web.
Manhapra, A., Arias, A. J., & Ballantyne, J. C. (2018). The conundrum of opioid tapering in long-term opioid therapy for chronic pain: a commentary. Substance Abuse, 39(2), 152-161. Web.