Pain management in the wake of the opioid crisis

Pain management in the wake of the opioid crisis 
Forbes; by Web Golinkin; 7/15/24 
Pain is the single most frequent reason for patient visits in the United States. An estimated 20 percent of adults experience chronic pain, and nearly seven percent experience a level of chronic pain that limits their daily activities. However, most doctors and other healthcare professionals have very little education in pain management, according to Scott Fishman, MD, an internationally recognized expert in pain management, ... This lack of education was one of the main causes of the Opioid Crisis, Fishman says ... of the part of the crisis that was caused by the over-prescribing of opioids, many clinicians have become so wary of the medical-legal issues surrounding pain management that they have gone from an overly liberal approach to a restrictive one in which some prescribers are effectively abandoning patients who need to have their symptoms treated. Both extremes are frequently fueled by lack of knowledge and training, according to Fishman. ... The solution is to close the education gap ...