09-03-2019, 03:01 PM
(09-03-2019, 01:35 PM)michaelsean Wrote: Not sure where you get that. I was physically addicted to alcohol. I no longer am. I drank all day every day. I no longer do so.
I get that from education, training, and experience.
Physical dependence and addiction are not the same.
I'll use pain management patients as an example. Most pain management patients are prescribed opioids to control their pain. One hundred percent of those patients will eventually become physically dependent upon the opioids if they take them long enough and will go through withdrawal if they stop them abruptly without weaning off of them. Some of those patients may progress from physical dependence to addiction, but not 100%. If you're physically dependent upon a medication such as an opioid to treat pain, but you are taking it therapeutically, aren't abusing it or taking it for non-therapeutic reasons, and it isn't causing other problems in your life then that patient isn't addicted, but they are physically dependent.
