It Hurts –
March 27, 2019 – I am not alone. Victims of tragic accidents, disease onset, combat wounds, complicated surgeries, workplace injuries, gun violence or even a simple fall off a ladder are among the 20 million Americans like me who experience some form of high-impact, chronic and often debilitating pain. Many, given a second chance at life after a serious illness or injury, tragically choose suicide over pain. Why? The most unfortunate among them, those with life-altering, unspeakable pain, are being denied access to the medications they need to go on. Their doctors, now numbering nearly 70 percent of our front-line physicians, have enlisted in the nation’s war on opioids. Many have turned away from their patients in chronic pain.
