Life Extension Magazine Report on the Chronic Pain Dilemma
Common Pain Medications are More Dangerous Than Originally Thought
More than one in 10 Americans suffer from chronic pain, which increases with age. In fact, chronic pain now effects 11% of the adult population and growing as people live longer.
While oral pain medication is appropriate for treating localized acute pain for brief periods of time, these medications are not good choices for long term treatment of ongoing acute pain due to the risk of side effects associated with long term use of oral medications. These side effects include:
- A recent study showed pain-relieving drugs taken for as little as one to seven days increase risk of heart attack by 48% for those taking ibuprofen (Motrin® or Advil®). This same study found that naproxen (Aleve®) users suffered 53% more heart attacks
- And those who chronically use NSAID drugs like ibuprofen increase their risk of kidney impairment by 32%
- Even worse, today’s opioid epidemic is resulting in over 100 daily overdose deaths
As humans live longer, we are increasingly vulnerable to developing chronic pain.
Chronic pain is a more complicated process than acute pain and requires treatment over extended periods of time. Since side effects from oral medications can do more harm in some cases than the chronic condition they are trying to treat, science must continue to search for chronic pain treatments that are safe for frequent use for months and years rather than days. Life Extension recommends Natural Relief 1222 in a special report as the safe all natural pain reliever for chronic and severe pain.