Tramadol

[lankou]

A disabled friend of mine who lives a long way away from me. (Too far away to visit,) has just been put on Tramadol for pain, he was on morphine.  Has anyone experience of Tramadol because I am concerned about my friend?

[Sunshine Meadows]

I have family visiting over the weekend so will post more later.


Ii have been taking Tramadol for many years for Trigeminal Neuralgia and it works reasonable well. I routinely take four a day and on worse days up to eight. In my case I have not found it to be addictive or to have major side affects. Given you friend was on morphine and could be going from unremitting high levels of pain I am not sure Tramadol alone would be enough. I find taking it when pain starts and routinely works better than trying to control pain that has ramped up.


 

[Sunny Clouds]

I had it briefly years ago.  It seemed to help and I had no noticeable side-effects for me personally.

Some general points you may know anyway.  No offence at all taken if you've considered all this and my apologies if it's teaching my grandmother to suck eggs. We all have different experiences.

Like many pain medications, and indeed many other medications, it carries risks of side-effects that one should watch out for, including potentially very serious side-effects, and some people have withdrawal problems.  That being said, if we never took medication that has a risk of side-effects, we'd never take medication.

I am biased in my views because for many years I had hideous chronic pain from arthritis, and finally worked out that for me personally, medication made it worse rather than better, and that thinking techniques helped me best. 

(Ignoring it is no good for my particular personality.  I have to briefly focus on it, maybe a few times a day, and reassure my subconscious that the 'alarm' sounded by the pain is a  'routine test of the alarm' not a  'new emergency'.  My brain then seems to be able to ignore it for a while.  Others would find that made it worse and have to focus on ignoring their pain.)

Also, I know from the combination of research and from family experiences in relation to other drugs (e.g. SSRIs) that when people say they have different positive/negative effects and different side-effects from the same medication, it's a genuine potential issue for people, and often relates to things like available enzymes in the body, which may be genetic or may arise from what else is being taken/eaten.  (Think of how grapefruit is a problem with some medicines.)

So I'm a very strong believer in watching out for one's own symptoms and being very aware that what helps one person may not help another and vice-versa.

I hope that you can influence your friend to keep an eye open for problems, and perhaps take into account problems with other drugs, e.g. what issues he had with the morphine, and explore what other things besides drugs might help, without being prescriptive about it, and whilst perhaps reassuring him that you know people (here) who've said it's helped them.

That being said, if I'm saying what you already knew, my apologies.  I say that because I'm feeling very jumpy today about having asked a question on another site and having felt, perhaps unfairly, that the people there were treating me as if I hadn't thought of the obvious.

[lankou]

I hope that you can influence your friend

That would require firearms.

[Sunny Clouds]

I hope that you can influence your friend

That would require firearms.

You didn't mention your friend was a cat!

Anyway, there's a good chance the tramadol will help, and if he's switched from morphine to tramadol, hopefully he and his doctor will be able to make another switch if the tramadol doesn't suit.

[lankou]

You didn't mention your friend was a cat!

Anyway, there's a good chance the tramadol will help, and if he's switched from morphine to tramadol, hopefully he and his doctor will be able to make another switch if the tramadol doesn't suit.

My friend is 6feet 5inches tall, and it is painful for me to know he is now in such a bad state of health. He is in sheltered accommodation.
He is visited by carers and a nurse. He has now, which came as a shock to me given, up alcohol.
IF I lived close enough to visit him I would.

[Sunny Clouds]

I hate it when friends aren't visitable.  I had two very, very close long-term friends who were both telephone friends, each over a hundred miles away.  One I had met fewer than half a dozen times, the other I had never met.  Both developed dementia whilst I was looking after my father.  Another good friend, who'd been both local and telephone moved a little further away then developed dementia whilst I was looking after my father.  She was in sheltered housing and not answering her door, and getting to the phone less and less.  Her son was visiting her, but I didn't have his number.  Eventually a neighbour saw me and let me in, and I visited when I could, but it was only a few months after that that she died.

I know each of our circumstances are different but I just hope it helps a little to know others have a sense of what it feels like to be far from someone you care about.

[ally]

Due to my ongoing neuropathic pain, I’ve been on many various pain meds.  Some worked, some didn’t.  Tramadol did work up to a point.  However, I developed what I could describe as twitching.  It was discovered than I’m allergic to it.  It’s on my medical records.  I’m now on oxycodone m/r one tablet every 12 hours, which works well for me.  That’s coupled with amitriptlyne for nerve pain.  If the pain is very bad I take paracetamol, or, lidocaine patches.  If tramadol is prescribed by a GP, then I can see no no harm in trying it.  If, after a few weeks, or, whatever,  there’s noticeable adverse side effects, then, I wouldn’t hesitate to stop it, and, try something else.   There’s many other pain meds, such as oxycodone as I am on, that can be effective.