suicide Archives - The Painful Truth

Marcus Welby, M.D. Is the Wrong Doctor for These Times

The Marcus Welby Fantasy Lives in the Past

Many people fantasize about having a folksy doctor like Marcus Welby, M.D. An idealized physician, Dr. Welby didn’t have to worry about malpractice insurance, co-payments, political agendas, interference by government agencies, or bureaucratic matters of any kind. He could be fully present for his patients.

Dr. Welby was a fictional character. Robert Young, the actor who portrayed him, may have convinced us that Dr. Welby was real, and it wasn’t all that difficult for television viewers to suspend disbelief. During the 1970s, when the show aired, many of us had a doctor similar to Dr. Welby.

What Is a Human Life Worth?

President’s Council of Economic Advisers Calculate the Value of a Human Life

President Trump has declared the opioid crisis to be a national health emergency and appears to be developing the rationale for funding interventions to combat the program. The first step is to update the cost of the opioid crisis.

The President’s Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) recently published a report estimating the cost of the opioid crisis in 2015 to be $504 billion.

For that calculation, the CEA estimated the value of a life to be about $10.1 million.

Do Opioids Impact Life Expectancy?

Meet Rachel and Lorna

Meet Rachel ^* and Lorna. They are very different women, but they have one thing in common: they both used opioids.

One morning, Rachel maneuvered her maroon Civic into a parking place at a local breakfast joint to buy opioids from her dealer. Accompanied by her two-year-old daughter and her brother, she had never felt more like a criminal. While Rachel never turned to heroin or other street drugs, she used prescription opioids for non medical reasons.

Insomnia Is More Than an Inconvenience

“Sleep that knits up the ravell’d sleeve of care,
The death of each day’s life, sore labour’s bath,
Balm of hurt minds, great nature’s second course,
Chief nourisher in life’s feast.”

‒William Shakespeare, Macbeth

Why We Need Sleep

Shakespeare may be complicated, but the universal need for sleep is not. The “Chief nourisher” is, indeed, a major function of sleep. It scavenges toxins produced during the wakeful hours which are literally “the death of each day’s life.” It results in “hurt minds” or damage that may be irreparable. Sleep scavenges and disposes of the poisons that allow the system to be revitalized with a “second course” or another day.

Women, Opioids, Benzodiazepines and Pain: A Potential Deadly Combination

When we think of the segments of the population who have been most affected by the opioid epidemic, we tend to think of poor, unemployed people who live in rural areas. In September of 2016, I published a blog called “Tough Times Feed America’s Opioid Epidemic: What You Need To Know.” In it, I described how the disease of addiction and overdoses can infest an economically-challenged community. I referenced a CNN article written by Wayne Drash and Max Blau, “In America’s drug death capital: How heroin is scarring the next generation,” that tells the story of how addiction, poverty, and social issues together have opened the door to increased opioid use and deaths in America’s heartland. Additionally, I mentioned a book titled Dreamland: The True Tale of America’s Opiate Epidemic, in which author Sam Quinones ties the opioid epidemic to the same risk factors: poverty, hopelessness, and unemployment.

Understanding the Roots to the Opioid Crisis

Every time I hear about an opioid-related overdose death, I can only feel empathy for the family of the decedent. Whether it’s the result of using street drugs that are laced with fentanyl or carfentanil, as in the case of a 21-year-old woman from Virginia, or a person in pain who accidentally overdoses, each death is far more to me than a statistic. I grieve for the victims and their families. Our society suffers the loss together.

The Painful Truth About Suicide

Suicide Rates Have Reached a 30-year High

Suicide rates have reached a 30-year high, according to the New York Times. “This is part of the larger emerging pattern of evidence of the links between poverty, hopelessness and health,” according to Robert D. Putnam, a professor of public policy at Harvard University.

It’s true that poverty, hopelessness, and health issues do factor into the suicide problem. In fact, an article just published in Rheumatology shows a link between people, especially women, who have been diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and suicides. Co-morbid depressive disorders preceded the suicides 90% of the time. The conclusion we can draw is that the pain of RA for some patients causes depression which, in turn, can lead to suicide.

The Marcus Welby Fantasy Lives in the Past

President’s Council of Economic Advisers Calculate the Value of a Human Life

Meet Rachel and Lorna

“Sleep that knits up the ravell’d sleeve of care, The death of each day’s life, sore labour’s bath, Balm of hurt minds, great nature’s second course, Chief nourisher in life’s feast.”

‒William Shakespeare, Macbeth

Why We Need Sleep

Suicide Rates Have Reached a 30-year High

“Sleep that knits up the ravell’d sleeve of care,
The death of each day’s life, sore labour’s bath,
Balm of hurt minds, great nature’s second course,
Chief nourisher in life’s feast.”