For Veterans with PTSD A New Demon Thei
For Veterans with PTSD, A New Demon: Their Meds
Threat of Addiction to Prescription Painkillers Heightened With Mental Illness
By
Thomas Catan
@tomcatan
Thomas.Catan@wsj.com
Thomas Catan
Biography
Thomas Catan
@tomcatan
Thomas.Catan@wsj.com
Thomas Catan
Biography
Updated Nov. 10, 2013 10:32 p.m. ET
NEWPORT, N.H.—Desperation drove Timothy Fazio, a former Marine, to turn up around midnight at a veterans' hospital near Boston. His post-traumatic stress disorder was causing flashbacks and blackouts. He had leapt from a balcony.
And he had overdosed, twice, on painkillers originally prescribed for a hand injury suffered in Iraq.
"I want detox," Mr. Fazio told doctors that night in 2008, his medical files say.
More
Final Toast for Doolittle Raiders
After a week of withdrawal, Mr. Fazio checked himself out of the Veterans Health Administration hospital—and was given 168 pills of the same opium like drug he was already addicted to, according to his files, which The Wall Street Journal has reviewed. The next day, the hospital gave him another 168 pills.
PTSD and painkillers are the twin pillars of a new mental-health crisis in America. Many of the more than two million Americans who served in Iraq or Afghanistan suffer, as Mr. Fazio does, from a mixture of pain and PTSD. The VA treats many of them with powerful opioid painkillers for their pain. But opioids can be a combustible mix with mental illness because of a heightened addiction risk.
Effectively, some critics say, it amounts to treating mental illness with addictive narcotics.
A study by a VA researcher found that veterans with PTSD were nearly twice as likely to be prescribed opioids as those without mental-health problems. They were more likely to get multiple opioid painkillers and to get the highest doses. Veterans with PTSD were more than twice as likely to suffer bad outcomes like injuries and overdoses if they were prescribed opioid painkillers, the study found.
In Mr.
Threat of Addiction to Prescription Painkillers Heightened With Mental Illness
By
Thomas Catan
@tomcatan
Thomas.Catan@wsj.com
Thomas Catan
Biography
Thomas Catan
@tomcatan
Thomas.Catan@wsj.com
Thomas Catan
Biography
Updated Nov. 10, 2013 10:32 p.m. ET
NEWPORT, N.H.—Desperation drove Timothy Fazio, a former Marine, to turn up around midnight at a veterans' hospital near Boston. His post-traumatic stress disorder was causing flashbacks and blackouts. He had leapt from a balcony.
And he had overdosed, twice, on painkillers originally prescribed for a hand injury suffered in Iraq.
"I want detox," Mr. Fazio told doctors that night in 2008, his medical files say.
More
Final Toast for Doolittle Raiders
After a week of withdrawal, Mr. Fazio checked himself out of the Veterans Health Administration hospital—and was given 168 pills of the same opium like drug he was already addicted to, according to his files, which The Wall Street Journal has reviewed. The next day, the hospital gave him another 168 pills.
PTSD and painkillers are the twin pillars of a new mental-health crisis in America. Many of the more than two million Americans who served in Iraq or Afghanistan suffer, as Mr. Fazio does, from a mixture of pain and PTSD. The VA treats many of them with powerful opioid painkillers for their pain. But opioids can be a combustible mix with mental illness because of a heightened addiction risk.
Effectively, some critics say, it amounts to treating mental illness with addictive narcotics.
A study by a VA researcher found that veterans with PTSD were nearly twice as likely to be prescribed opioids as those without mental-health problems. They were more likely to get multiple opioid painkillers and to get the highest doses. Veterans with PTSD were more than twice as likely to suffer bad outcomes like injuries and overdoses if they were prescribed opioid painkillers, the study found.
In Mr.