CHALLENGING the ORTHODOXY of OXY

OxyContin - oxycodone controlled-release - is a godsend when used as prescribed to relieve severe pain. It's also a highly addictive narcotic opioid that can be lethal if misused. Should we be asking more questions about painkillers – and requesting less risky alternatives?

- GLYNIS HORNING

When Cape Town medical researcher Heidi Facey-Thomas took her 24-year-old daughter Anna to a day clinic to have her wisdom teeth removed, she was taken aback when she overheard the young anaesthetist talking to the mother of a 19-year old about to go into theatre before Anna. He said he would give her intravenous OxyContin and then send her home with 10 OxyContin tablets so she would have no pain.

‘He was reassuring us. But as a trained nurse, I asked him why Oxy was being given to young people when it has a serious reputation and is highly addictive, and there are alternatives. He said he himself had had Oxy and it worked well – Anna could take a few tablets if necessary and throw the rest away, as he’d done, because he’d “felt strange” after taking three or four. He was very relaxed about it and I didn’t like to argue.’

Both young women’s procedures went smoothly. But back in the ward, a drowsy Anna complained of pain.

‘A nurse then gave her an intravenous injection of OxyContin. In minutes, Anna was cold and clammy. Her blood pressure plummeted and all the alarms on the machine she was hooked up to went off. It was terrifying. Her surgeon and anaesthetist had already left the day hospital, but I found a theatre nurse, who said Anna had been given OxyContin before she left the theatre. She’d been given a double dose. It took two hours for her pulse to get above 40 (normal is 60 to 100 beats a minute) and for the alarms to stop.