Amateur athletes turn to painkillers to perform
AMATEUR athletes have emerged as the new codeine addicts as Ireland battles a silent addiction to painkillers.
Medical professionals are also among a wave of addicts in the grip of a potentially lethal addiction to over-thecounter painkillers.
Painkiller abuse is now rife in Ireland, with athletes popping codeine-based pills to enhance performance or speed up recovery from injury.
Their prescription medicine becomes habit-forming and they must have higher and more frequent doses to feed the addiction.
Middle-aged women are particularly at risk, along with single people in their 20s and 30s.
People with mental health problems such as depression and anxiety are also at risk.
The main drug culprits tend to be extra-strong painkillers that contain up to 12mg codeine, and are combined with other painkillers like ibuprofen or paracetamol.
People also at risk include cancer patients, accident victims, or patients with chronic back pain or migraine.
Experts say addiction to household painkillers is now a serious problem with major health impacts.
Addicts often go to great lengths to disguise the problem once it has taken hold.
Physical effects of the addiction include internal bleeding and organ damage and, with abrupt withdrawal, there is the risk of suffering a life-threatening condition called status epilepticus, where the brain is in a state of persistent seizure.
Painkiller addiction can occur either psychologically or physically.
Dr Fiona Weldon, a clinical psychologist, says the drugs are highly addictive and should not be viewed as a painkilling panacea.
“It is one of the newer addictions that we’re seeing,” she said. “Younger athletes, in particular, think they simply can’t miss a training session. They’re under huge pressure to perform, and there isn’t enough focus on the care of the body and recovery period.
“Very often athletes end up with an injury through sport, they want to recover quicker and get their body back on track, so they want to reduce the body’s pain. If they’re not working with a very good trainer, or the expectations of the individual are very high, very often they get caught in a cycle of taking these medications.
“They’re then dealing with a body that hasn’t healed properly which is being put under extra pressure.
“On top of this they’re developing a dependency.
“People end up mixing medications as well, which is really concerning.
“If someone has a sports injury and they use pain medication, what’s happening is a lot of people don’t realise they can become addicted very quickly — particularly codeine-based medications.
“Often it’s prescribed for inflammation, and over two weeks of use, people can experience dependency.”
Dr Weldon said it could be the case that a mental health issue went undiagnosed and the medication was used to numb physical and psychological pain.
She says addiction to painkillers is also a growing concern among members of the medical community.
“For some it’s stress related, or there may be relationship or financial difficulties.
“Increasingly, I’m seeing people who are finding it difficult to integrate. They might have trained abroad and are finding it difficult to mix. Culturally they find themselves isolated; they want to self-medicate their own psychological pain.
“I’m also seeing people who are entrepreneurial as well as those involved in the teaching profession — there’s a lot of stress involved in those cases.”
She cited a recent study which found six out of 10 deaths between 2004 and 2014 where alcohol was implicated, also involved other drugs, mainly opiates.
Codeine, part of the same family as morphine and heroin, works by mimicking the action of naturally occurring pain-reducing chemicals called endorphins. It’s an effective painkiller but can become addictive in big enough doses if taken for long enough.
This means the body will build up a tolerance, increasing the need to take more to achieve the same effect.
It could also result in serious withdrawal symptoms, such as severe headaches, restlessness, irritability, sleep problems and anxiety.
Exceeding the recommended dose of over-the-counter painkillers long term can also result in liver and kidney damage as well as ulcers, stomach bleeding and gallstones.