For Some Troops, Powerful Drug Cocktails Have Deadly Results

[ensho]

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/13/us/13drugs.html?hp


-snip-

He returned from his second deployment to Iraq complaining of back pain, insomnia, anxiety and nightmares. Doctors diagnosed post-traumatic stress disorder and prescribed powerful cocktails of psychiatric drugs and narcotics.

Yet his pain only deepened, as did his depression. “I have almost given up hope,” he told a doctor in 2008, medical records show. “I should have died in Iraq.”

-snip-
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I can't get the page to copy any more of the article. maybe one of you can have better luck.

article says too many of the suicides are from too many prescribed drugs used together.

[pinboy3niner]

1. Another excerpt:

After a decade of treating thousands of wounded troops, the military’s medical system is awash in prescription drugs — and the results have sometimes been deadly.

By some estimates, well over 300,000 troops have returned from Iraq or Afghanistan with P.T.S.D., depression, traumatic brain injury or some combination of those. The Pentagon has looked to pharmacology to treat those complex problems, following the lead of civilian medicine. As a result, psychiatric drugs have been used more widely across the military than in any previous war.

But those medications, along with narcotic painkillers, are being increasingly linked to a rising tide of other problems, among them drug dependency, suicide and fatal accidents — sometimes from the interaction of the drugs themselves. An Army report on suicide released last year documented the problem, saying one-third of the force was on at least one prescription medication.

“Prescription drug use is on the rise,” the report said, noting that medications were involved in one-third of the record 162 suicides by active-duty soldiers in 2009. An additional 101 soldiers died accidentally from the toxic mixing of prescription drugs from 2006 to 2009.

[ensho]

2. thanks much pinboy for adding to this thread

our troops deserve better medical treatment.

what's up with military doctors?

[pinboy3niner]

4. Thanks for posting this story, ensho

After reports of a rash of troops, all on multiple prescribed meds, dying in their beds, it's good to see this getting more scrutiny.

:thumbsup:

[Maine_Nurse]

5. They are completely overwhelmed...

and their psych meds are often being prescribed by non-psych docs.

[L. Coyote]

7. MORE

All had five or more medications in their systems when they died, including opiate painkillers and mood-altering psychiatric drugs, but not alcohol. All had switched drugs repeatedly, hoping for better results that never arrived.

All died in their sleep.

[Maine_Nurse]

3. I have seen meds lists that scared the hell out of me...

5 or 6 psych meds, often on top of narcotics is not uncommon. Some of these poor vets are walking around in a complete fog all the time and not receiving any supportive treatment to go along with the meds.

[polly7]

6. The number of meds some of these people are being prescribed

shocks the hell out of me. Tolerance, inter-dose withdrawal, .... it can be a road straight to hell if they're not being monitored closely. I believe accidental probably applies to more of the deaths than suicide, jmo.

[pinboy3niner]

11. I think you're right about the suicides, polly7

What is really striking to me is that young troops on these multi-med cocktails are suddenly dying in their sleep, in their beds. These sudden deaths are especially disturbing, and they raise the question of the role of drug interactions--something that needs to be investigated urgently.

[pinboy3niner]

8. Kick

[RandomThoughts]

9. He probably did, and is in some pergatory.

But that is another story.

[Odin2005]

10. This is not about helping their PTSD, this is about making them ready to be cannon fodder again!

:grr: