Submitted by Art Fougner MD, Jan 3, 2008 06:53

An ER doc responds ...

"...The study admits that the researchers had access to pain scores for most of the study years. But they chose not to publish the pain scores or analyze the prescription trends with the pain scores. Just because someone receives a non-narcotic for pain does not mean their pain was not effectively managed. Have biostatisticians ever heard of using Imitrex for headaches or are you too wrapped up in your chi-squares? How about Toradol as first line therapy for kidney stones? Or GI cocktails for abdominal pain? Oops … all those non-narcotic medications would skew the results, wouldn't they? Anyone beginning to wonder why the researchers chose to report on the use of narcotics rather than amount of pain control?"

http://whitecoatrants.wordpress.com/2008/01/02/whites-get-better-pain-control-in-the-ed/

The media buzz this article has generated suggests the authors' motivation for ignoring pain management in favor of "narcotics." Hmmmmm.

Note: Comments are screened, and in some cases edited, before posting. We reserve the right to reject anything we find objectionable.