Inadequate Pain Relief a Human Rights Violation
In a
report on medical complicity in human rights violations, Human Rights Watch includes lack of pain relief as an example of torture.
"Our report found that fewer than 4 percent of the roughly 1 million terminal cancer patients in India who suffer severe pain every year were able to receive adequate treatment. Even though the majority of patients who arrive at regional cancer centers come at an advanced stage of cancer, and in severe pain, most cancer hospitals have no palliative care departments, do not offer any palliative care services, and do not even stock morphine-globally recognized as an inexpensive and effective drug for pain relief."
Even in the U.S., we hear reports of health care providers being afraid to adequately treat pain, or even families resisting pain treatment for their loved ones. When my grandfather was dying of mesothelioma, his wife threw away his pain medication so he wouldn't get addicted.
Have you experienced, personally or professionally, a resistance to providing adequate pain relief?