By Fred Brown, Guest Columnist

I experienced in mid-life something that I wish on no one. Because of this event, I live with a disease called chronic pain.  I am considered a “pain patient” by the medical community, but I try not to see myself as such. I am a human being, living my life to the best of my ability.

I had several surgeries to fix a problem in my spine.  These procedures not only failed to fix the problem, they left me with severe and chronic intractable pain.

There is a way to relieve my pain and make me more functional, and it has been part of my life for over two decades: Opioid pain medication prescribed by a board-certified pain management physician.

Opioids give me quality of life and let me be a spouse, father, grandfather and great-grandfather.

The problem I have is that there are people in state and federal agencies, along with legislators in our government, who think they know better than my trained doctor. These officials make claims without any science to back them up. They don’t want me to take opioids or say I should only use them at very low doses that do not work.

There are millions of legitimate chronic pain patients like me who need these drugs. They are essentially being told, “Sorry, we do not want your physician to treat you the way they know best. And if you don’t do what we think is best for you, we can do nasty things to you and your doctor.”

These officials can use state and federal powers to take away your physician’s license to practice medicine. And if that is not enough, they can even put them in jail.  The government is persecuting doctors for legitimately prescribing opioids for chronic pain.

There is strong evidence -- using our own government's information -- to prove physicians have not caused the crisis. The writing of opioid prescriptions has been coming down for several years. What has been increasing are patients turning to street drugs or, even worse. committing suicide. They are not able to obtain relief the right way, so they go to the streets!

There has been so much disinformation about opioid medication that our media has distributed to the public.   Over and over, we hear that physicians have overprescribed opioids and caused the “opioid crisis.”

Over 40 years ago, there was a motion picture made called “Network.”  In the movie, there is a fantastic scene where an anchorman named Howard Beale becomes so frustrated and angry during a show that he shouts over and over, “I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!”

Then he encourages Americans across the country to open their windows and do the same. Millions do.

To my fellow patients, advocates, friends, doctors and other healthcare workers. It is time to write, call and communicate with your Senator and Congressmen.

Like Howard Beale, tell them you’re mad as hell and you’re not going to take it anymore.   

Fred Brown lives with degenerative disc disease, bone spurs, stenosis and other spinal problems. He is a patient advocate and volunteer with The Alliance for the Treatment of Intractable Pain (ATIP). 

Pain News Network invites other readers to share their stories with us. Send them to editor@painnewsnetwork.org. 

The information in this column should not be considered as professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. It is for informational purposes only and represents the author’s opinions alone. It does not inherently express or reflect the views, opinions and/or positions of Pain News Network.