aren't we supposed to shatter, not set, ceilings?

My former home state of Washington has decided to further stigmatize and hamper those in need of chronic pain management by suggesting random urine tests for those taking opioids to manage their pain, as well as setting a maximum daily limit on dosing for opioids, 120mg of morphine or its equivalence.

While these are set as guidelines for primary care physicians who might not have the skillset to manage high dose chronic pain patients, the basic problem is that pain management specialists are scarce, and good ones are even rarer than that. And because these guidelines come from a government agency, there is real fear that they will be taken as rules, and not guidelines.

Aside from this though is the even more basic problem: the assumption that if you are taking opioids, you must be abusing other drugs and so should be checked up on via random urine tests. It adds insult to injury - not only are you not trusted to be honest about your pain, because you must manage it with an opioid, but they're going to tell you to your face that because you take a certain class of medication, you are untrustworthy enough that you must be subject to random urine screens.

What a lovely way to foster a healthy doctor/patient relationship.