F.D.A. Won’t Order Doctors to Get Pain-Drug Training

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4. People with endstage disease with chronic pain who are not in hospice have a really hard time with

the frequent increases in pain meds that are required as their tumors grow and grow. I'm a hospice and palliative care nurse. Some of my patients are on palliative care because they are still getting chemo and or radiation so they don't qualify for hospice but they need frequent increases in narcotics but the state public aid system makes this difficult here in Illinois and I am glad when they are able to transition to hospice. With a verbal order from a doctor, a hospice nurse can call in narcotic changes to our pharmacy and the medications come to the home the same day. When they aren't in hospice, it's often phone calls to Springfield pleading the case for the increase.