Turn the Tide Campaign Brings Unintended Consequences 

It began just about a year ago, when the CDC Guideline for Prescribing Opioids for Chronic Pain provided “recommendations for primary care clinicians who were prescribing opioids for chronic pain outside of active cancer treatment, palliative care, and end-of-life care.” The emphasis is mine. The goal, as the CDC’s web site stated, was to improve “… the way opioids are prescribed through clinical practice guidelines” and to “ensure patients have access to safer, more effective chronic pain treatment while reducing the number of people who misuse, abuse, or overdose from these drugs.”