Whenever we feel pain, we try to experiment with our own judgment on various pain medications. Our last recourse is to consult doctors whenever we sense that things are really going out of our hands. But since we are all leading a busy and fast life, we normally cannot fit ourselves into a lifestyle recommended by our doctors. Hence, we solely start relying on the pain medications. But these medications can only prevent the brain from receiving the pain signals, but are not the remedies for the exact causes of the pain. We know that pain killers have side effects, but we still move a step further by formulating our own strategies regarding the use of such drugs. Such behavior is based on certain pain killer mistakes which keep on haunting us:
- Taking Overdose: You should only follow the dosage prescribed by your doctor. The dosage recommended by him ensures greater effectiveness with minimal levels of risk. Overdose does not imply greater functioning of the drug, but it surely can invite harmful side effects. Even some people develop the habit of using two types of pain medications at the same time. These drugs can interact with each other producing adverse reactions. It has also been found that taking extra doses of a medication can stand in the way of proper functioning of the first dose.
- Buying OTC Drugs: We often tend to buy over-the-counter pain medications without the knowledge of our doctor. We even do not bother to go through the labels. Sometimes, we even think of combining two OTC drugs to get relief from some additional pain. But in actuality, the OTC pain medications are combination pills which are loaded with a full dose of pain-relief ingredients.
- Drinking: We should refrain from drinking alcoholic beverages with pain medications. These two react with each other and enhance each other's effect. Alcohol as well as pain killers produce an intoxicating effect and a combo can prove to be really harmful. In many cases, drinking with the pain killer called ibuprofen has caused bleeding ulcers. This habit can cause liver damages also.
- Driving After Taking Drugs: Drowsiness is often associated with the use of pain killer medications. The degree of this effect varies from one individual to the other. So you should try out one pill at your home initially. It is not safe to go out driving after taking two pills.
- Ignoring Drug Interactions: You should make a note of other medicines, supplements or herbal remedies that you are taking at present. These drugs can produce harmful side effects by interacting with pain killers. For instance, aspirin can affect the proper functioning of certain non-insulin diabetes drugs. So before your doctor offers you a prescription of pain medications, let him know about the other medications which you are taking.
- Sharing Prescription Drugs: The prescription drugs recommended by your doctor are based on your body's needs and criteria. These are solely meant for your own use. So it would be unwise if you refer these drugs to your friends. Your doctor has not judged your friends' conditions and so these drugs can cause serious effects in them.
- Ignoring the Pharmacist: It's okay if we are not reading the labels while purchasing a drug! But it's not, if we are not asking the pharmacist about the ingredients! It is better to spare a few minutes to get knowledge about the composition and the use of a drug from the pharmacist.
- Taking Expired Drugs: Once you get relieved from your pain, throw away the remaining pills. Otherwise, these pills would remain in your house and by the time you have another pain, these pills would have expired. Two things might happen - either the drug would not work or you might land up in the emergency department of your local hospital. Further, it is not very safe to store pain drugs at home owing to the increasing concerns on teen drug abuse.
- Breaking the Pills: Pills should not be taken apart, unless your doctor has instructed to do so. They don't work the way they're supposed to when taken apart the wrong way. Generally, time release and capsule supplied drugs should not be split and scored pills (represented with a line on the pill) may be safely split by cutting across the line.
Whenever possible, you should avoid taking pain medications and instead focus on targeting the exact cause of the pain in order to ensure an internal healing. Still if you cannot avoid pain killers, you should practice extra precaution and keep the above points in mind!
