Pain, Drugs, and Ethics

Pain remains one of the most common reasons that people seek medical attention in the United States today. One of the ways health care providers responded to pain being designated the “5th vital sign” was with their prescription pads. In order to respond to subjective pain-ratings, opioid analgesics began to be prescribed more liberally than in the past, presumably with the intention of responding to information about pain-related complaints now captured in routine assessments. This was in conce