Jordan Hoang
Mr.Ippolito
AP Biology C Even
3/7/19
Hoffman, Jan, and Abby Goodnough. “Good News: Opioid Prescribing Fell. The Bad? Pain
Patients Suffer, Doctors Say.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 6 Mar. 2019,
www.nytimes.com/2019/03/06/health/opioids-pain-cdc-guidelines.html.
Due to the ever growing crisis of opioid abuse in the country, the Trump administration has attempted to lower and regulate the prescribing of drugs by creating “course-correcting guidelines”. These are recommendations that doctors are meant to follow to avoid over-prescribing medications to those with drug addictions. Even though this process has been successful at lowering the amount of prescriptions that could be given to potential abusers, it hasn’t had all positive effects. Some people believe that opioids have become too much of a stigmatized and taboo topic in medicine; that they have become twisted into a crutch that should be considered dangerous and addictive. As a result, the amount of medicine that is being prescribed is going down so tremendously that it is harming those that legitimately have severe pain. This is ultimately another crisis doctors are trying to solve- to lower the abuse of opioids while being ethically considerate for those who actually need medication.
This is definitely a controversial and difficult topic for doctors to deal with. The dilemma for them is trying to find a balance in the amount of medication that they are prescribing. However, I personally think denying people access to opioids completely can have very bad side effects. Some people might have such bad pain- due to this denied access to medication- that they may become depressed or even worse, want to end their life. Instead, I feel as though doctors should take more records on the frequency that patients are receiving medications so that people are less likely to abuse it. In addition, the article mentioned that medical institutions aren’t doing much to find alternative methods to treat patients without the use of opioids. Implementing therapy, exercise, or relaxation methods alongside a low dosage of a certain drug could possibly help resolve this prevalent issue.
I enjoyed how the authors utilized credible sources and words from scientists throughout the article. It gave a more professional appeal to the piece. They did a great job at incorporating this information without making the article boring. However, I did feel as thought the piece was missing a personal view from a patient dealing with this issue. It would not only make the piece even more credible, but make the words of the author more relatable and relevant to the readers.
Ella Stupart
ReplyDeleteMr. Ippolito
March 8, 2019
Current Event 18
Citation:
Hoang, Jordan. Rev. of “Good News: Opioid Prescribing Fell. The Bad? Pain
Patients Suffer, Doctors Say.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 6 Mar. 2019,
https://bronxvilleapbiology.blogspot.com/2019/03/good-news-opioid-prescribing-fell-bad.html
Hoffman, Jan, and Abby Goodnough. “Good News: Opioid Prescribing Fell. The Bad? Pain
Patients Suffer, Doctors Say.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 6 Mar. 2019,
www.nytimes.com/2019/03/06/health/opioids-pain-cdc-guidelines.html.
One positive thing about Jordan’s review of this article is that she defines terms that may be confusing. For example, in her first paragraph, she defines “cours -correcting guidelines,” explaining that they are guidelines that doctors follow in order to prescribe a helpful, not harmful, dosage of opioids. Another thing that Jordan did well is that she acknowledged both sides of the argument before taking a stance. This gives the reader background on the issue and makes her a more credible author. A third strength in Jordan’s review is that she offers a solution to the issue in her second paragraph. She gives her opinion about the issue and offers a way that it can be dealt with. It is impressive that she is able to offer a solution that she came up with by herself.
In order to improve her review, Jordan could have included more opinions of professionals as well as statistics about opioid usage. Including the opinions of professionals on the topic would make her a more credible author as well as give the reader and better understanding on the issue. Including statistics about the issue would help the reader grasp the magnitude of the dilemma and would help them form an educated stance.
This review was extremely interesting to read. The opioid dilemma has been an extremely prominent in today’s society and it is interesting to learn about different aspects of it and how doctors are dealing with patients getting addicted to opioids. I hope that in the future a new way to reduce great amounts of pain is discovered that is not damaging to the human brain. Overall, Jordan’s review was well written, informative, and interesting. I will be sure to continue to keep up with this topic in the future.
Anna Normand
ReplyDeleteAP Biology
Mr. Ippolito
7 March 2019
Hoffman, Jan, and Abby Goodnough. “Good News: Opioid Prescribing Fell. The Bad? Pain
Patients Suffer, Doctors Say.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 6 Mar. 2019,
www.nytimes.com/2019/03/06/health/opioids-pain-cdc-guidelines.html.
One thing that I really liked about Jordan’s article was that she included medical and political standpoints on the issue she is talking about. Not only does she talk about new policies dictated by the White House, she also talks about doctors’ opinions on this issue and the general feeling on the topic within the medical community. I also enjoyed how she defined important terms that have to do with opioid addiction, so as to make the article more understandable for the reader. I also enjoyed her recommendations for ways to treat opioid addiction and her idea to have a real story about addiction included in the article.
One thing I think Jordan could improve in her article is elaborating more on the new policies in place to prevent addiction. The new guidelines from the Trump administration have faced some backlash and it would be interesting to know exactly what the guidelines are and the possible effects they might have. I also thought she could have included some statistics on opioid addiction in the United States to provide some context for the reader about this huge issue.
Overall, Jordan’s article provided me with political and medical insight into opioid addiction and helped me to understand it much better. I feel that I now have a good understanding of this issue and am looking forward to learning more about it.
Caroline McGrath
ReplyDelete9/24/19
Current Event 3
Hoffman, Jan, and Abby Goodnough. “Good News: Opioid Prescribing Fell. The Bad? Pain
Patients Suffer, Doctors Say.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 6 Mar. 2019,
www.nytimes.com/2019/03/06/health/opioids-pain-cdc-guidelines.html.
One positive thing about Jordan Hoang’s review of “Good News: Opioid Prescribing Fell. The Bad? Pain. Patients Suffer, Doctors Say” is the fact that she defines some words that may be confusing to first time readers, for instance in the first paragraph she defines “course correcting guidelines,” detailing that these are recommendations that prevent doctors from prescribing to potential abusers. This definition makes the reader more aware of the issue and provides an important piece of information. Another thing Hoang does well is provide standpoints from both a political and medical point of view; she acknowledged the Trump administrations’ role in the issue, while touching on the opinions of the medical field, showing the major impact that this crisis has. The most important thing Hoang did was provide context and explanation for both sides before taking a stance and offering a possible solution. She describes both the positives for the recommendations, while also providing why critics are attacking it. Following this, she gives her opinion of a solution: “ I feel as though doctors should take more records on the frequency that patients are receiving medications so that people are less likely to abuse it”. This makes the reader fully aware of her point of view.
I found a hard time understanding some of the sentence structure Hoang used, as the punctuation fluctuated and began to impact how the reader was reading the tone of the review. Ultimately, I was able to understand the review, but I was forced to read a few sentences multiple times in order to fully gain the idea she was putting out. I think another thing she can add is statistic for opiod usage, it is a major problem in our society, and unfortunately there was little information about the impact of opioids in her review.
This review was interesting from beginning to end, with the most interesting part being the article itself, as these new recommendations are fascinating and may be able to solve the epidemic. Opioid abuse is something that is growing and needs to be stopped, before reading this article the answer seemed years away, but now after reading I understand more about the opioid crisis itself, and of the possible solutions doctors see for the future.