Is your painkiller causing your headache?
A new guideline out of the UK advises physicians and healthcare professionals to consider the possibility of “medication overuse” in their patients who have been taking pain medicines for up to half of the days in a month, over three months.
They occur when people take painkillers or triptan drugs too often for tension-type (“every day”) headaches or migraine attacks. Doing this can reduce their effectiveness and cause further pain.
I used to get terrible rebound headaches from caffeine, back when I was drinking 4-5 cups of coffee every day.
I don't have normal breakthrough pain medication, so thankfully I'm unlikely to be suffering from that, at least, although it's of course a concern. I'm on maintenance methadone (never increases), weekly dilaudid (too infrequent for rebound), and that's it.
It might be a new guideline, maybe in the UK, but I have found most doctors are aware of it.
Separately--oh, my god, when am I going to be back in my groove? I can't get work working, my apartment is ankle deep in all my belongings, I won't have a car until I do some cab juggling this afternoon. I'm entirely off balance, and feeling it...
I have to wrestle work into submission first.
My personal life can wait.
Happy Birthday, Sue!
Oy, ita. Sorry things are so hard right now.
Can I ask what brand, and where? Do they make you sleep hot? I hate sleeping hot...
Well, I wake up hot most mornings, but I think that's just perimenopause. I got the mattress topper at Target, don't recall the brand. It really has helped me sleep so much better--I was waking a couple times/night for several months, and was blaming the dog. Now I'm never going without a memory-foam topper again.
We have one, too--ordered it form Overstock. It is fabulous.
So, I love that fucking Gangnam Style video. I saw it for the first time yesterday and I was highly amused even though I didn't catch all the references. Now that I know a bit more, I am going to watch it again.
Birthday Happies, Sue!!
Keep on keeping the sky from those who want to take it away, Firefly!