just wondered if anyone has been prescribed morphine patches for pain?

[floozy]

i was using them resulting in some pain relief last summer but after a few months everywhere the patch touched my skin burnt to the point of scarring my chest . a consultant on the pain management team prescribed me the same drug but on a patch that had to be changed after 4 days instead of 7. i started using this patch on monday evening , spent all day yesterday curled up in bed with the electric blanket on in agony when i wasnt in a trance like sleep and this morning the patch site was burning and itching so bad i had to remove it . have been told if the patch doesnt work i can have morphine tablets that i place under my tongue , my real concern is how do the medics know if im allergic to the plaster or the morphine ? Help !

[LindseyMid]

Why have you been prescribed these? Do you something in addition to Fibro? I ask because strong opioids are not recommended for Fibro anyway. Some people do have them for breakthrough pain with uncontrolled Fibro, but they are unlikely to provide reasonable symptom relief because opioids cannot work as effectively in someone with Fibro. They are most suitable for someone who has another condition alongside the Fibro that cannot be managed in other ways - examples may include degenerative disc disease, severe arthritis, etc.

[floozy in reply to LindseyMid]

i do have other medical conditions but the patches were prescribed by my gp for fm, after the severe allergic reaction i had to them my hospital medical pain consultant prescribed me a different type of patch because he didnt know if i was allergic to the plaster but ive worn it for one day and its burnt my skin the same as before , so ive taken it off . i should have been to see my gp today as now i have to try sublingual bupreorphine but silly as this sound im too ill to go and see him

[wiccamom in reply to LindseyMid]

hey just came across this and all i have is fibro, i was on the patches, which i also was allergic to, now i have the tabs under the tongue, which only mask some pain! as soon as i begin household tasks i am in agony tho and have to rest. i have trusted my gp for some yrs now but lindsey mid has made me wonder if i am getting the best help possible???

[Brujah81]

I was on morphine patches and had a allergic reaction and had blisters and had scarring i ended up on MST, Morphine tablets and buprenorphine tablets which seemed to work really well until i had an operation in august and the hospital put me on oramorph and now i have to take it four times a day which is a little frustrating but works well too.

I was told by the doctor and the specialist that i was allergic to the glue on the patches.. i have tried several different makes of morphine patches and fentanyl patches too.. all of them did the same burning and blistering.

[Brujah81 in reply to Brujah81]

I do have hypermobility in addition to fibromyalgia but i do have severe fibromyalgia and hypermobility and i am bedbound and housebound most of the time.

[floozy in reply to Brujah81]

mmmm i seem to be having the same reaction with the burning and blistering , last time i was on the patches for some time and they seemed to help the pain in combination with all the other drugs , just took the edge off, enough for me to live some kind of life . now im wondering if i take the sublingual tablets am i going to have the same bad reaction only wont be able to see it , or is it just the plaster ? did you find the tablets helped you ?

[Brujah81 in reply to floozy]

I believe with me.. it was just the plaster or at least that is what i was told by the GP and specialist.. I used the sublingual tablets for breakthrough pain as and when required in combination with Morphine Sulphate 10mg twice daily and it seemed to take the edge of the pain.. to a degree that i could cope with the pain that was left.. it didnt take all the pain away but it was bareable.

[floozy in reply to Brujah81]

bearable will be excellent for me

[Brujah81 in reply to floozy]

I also found the MST and sub-lingual worked alot better than the patches for me because i had more control over the pain.. because there was something there for breakthrough.. i found it a little more effective if i took paracetamol with it.. my GP advised me to do that but i don't like taking paracetamol all of the time.

I hope that this helps you with your problem and that through the correct medication you end up in less pain.. feel free to message me if you want to talk or ask me anything else.. or tell me how you are getting on with the meds..

Hugs Brujah

[floozy in reply to Brujah81]

thanks i already take 4000mg paracetamol a day , lyrica 300mg twice a day , sertaline not including all the other meds im taking for other conditions . The patches were just taking the edge off the pain of fm just waiting to go to the pain management clinic , ive had my initial assesment so just see what they can offer

[WoollyMamath in reply to Brujah81]

I'm allergic to the glue on plasters too and get the burning/blistering. Its a darn nuisance if I ever cut myself!

[kavqc]

Hi there I am also on morphine patches used them for the last 12 months and they have been great I have had no blistering with them they upped the dossage before xmas and they are ok they have taken the pain to a manageable level

[floozy]

i found the patches to be of help the first time i had them , they took the edge off the pain they were the best combination of pain relief ive had until my body started reacting badly to them , im bothered that if i start to take the tablets i might be allergic to them and it not be the plaster at all

[WoollyMamath]

My GP had me on Morphine patches until I developed an allergy to the glue on the plaster too. I tried Oramorph for a while but it just made me sleep all the time so the doctor changed tack and put me onto GABAPENTIN supplemented with TRAMODOL & PARACETAMOL, which has been quite effective at managing my hip pain.

Although what I'm going to do when I become resistant to the Gabapentin I don't know.

[LindseyMid in reply to WoollyMamath]

If you do become tolerant of Gabapentin, Pregabalin is a very similar drug, so maybe discuss trying this with your doctor then.

[WoollyMamath in reply to LindseyMid]

Thank you - I shall make a note of this (no point in trying to remember, LOL!)

[Marytoma234 in reply to WoollyMamath]

Try plaxiea 50 mg it's really good for pain and after a while the tiredness wears off gabbepentin and pregablin your body becomes very tolerance to it and the Medes don't work but also take vitiam d 1000 mg ask your doc the help your body with the pain it's for lack of sun which we dont get and does work

[Cazie50]

I've been on patches for around 6 months now and find it ok, I get slight inflammation, but it's not the glue as it's restricted to the middle of the patch. This is managed with some cortisone cream. I went on the patches in replacement of daily Tramodol which I now only use for breakthrough pain.

[tiggerfan]

LindseyMid : I take dyhidrocodein for pain which is an opiod and this has been working for me for several years.

they are not working as well as they used to but that is usual for any of the pain meds I've been on since I was sixteen

morphine or fentanyl patches will prob be the next step for me pain management wise but I try to eek out the length of time I get out of things as I am only 43 and feel that eventually nothing will work anymore if I keep getting stronger and stronger meds

[MichelleGoodwin in reply to tiggerfan]

please don't use fentanyl unless you really have to as my body became so addicted to them there was talk of using methadone to get me off them! they didn't even touch my pain. as said before my specialist also said opioids do not generally work for FMS but do occasionally.

[LindseyMid in reply to tiggerfan]

If you have good symptom control on opioids, then great. That's just unusual with Fibro. You do need to watch the side effects, especially with the strronger opioids. And it's this balance that means opioids are not generally recommended for Fibro (limited benefit vs dangerous side effects is not good!).

It is possible to improve your symptoms through a multi-disciplinary approach (both medications and non-medication treatments). And that could mean you do not need stronger and stronger meds.

[Marytoma234 in reply to LindseyMid]

Hi lydnsey Could u tell me then i fi cant use opoids like bru Trans for fm then what ca- ni use because ive tried everything now the want to give me morphine liguid whichni dont want anybody have any suggestions as i am on at th e min 35 mg of transtec

[Mdaisy in reply to Marytoma234]

Hello Marytoma234,

Lindsey hasn't been on the forum for a while but all our information is on our website. To make it easier this FAQ may help as it has all links to recommended treatments;

healthunlocked.com/fibroact...

Here is a quote which also helps to explain why strong Opioids appear to be ineffective in treating Fibro;

Opioid medications do not work as efficiently in Fibro patients as in healthy people because of a lack of available opioid receptors in the brain of Fibro patients. According to the EULAR Guidelines for the Management of Fibro, strong opioids - e.g. morphine - are not recommended for Fibro. If a doctor is unwilling to prescribe strong opioids for a Fibro patient, it is not necessarily because they do not believe that the patient is in pain: probably more that they are unsure that the side effects and risk of addiction with strong opioids are worth it when they do not work very efficiently and other forms of medication may work better (Lindsey Middlemiss Founder & Chair of FibroAction 2009)

fibroaction-public.sharepoi...

Also interestingly this has been discussed here in the community as other members mention the same see link to post below;

healthunlocked.com/fibroact...

As Lindsey says side effects & dependency are things that you may need to think about especially for medication that may not help your symptoms.

I hope this helps

Best Wishes

Emma

FibroAction Administrator

[Sue15197]

PLEASE do not take morphine unless you absolutely have to, and then for a short time. It can cause your organs to work at 50% only. It happened to me 15.3.10 I went into kidney failure due to MST's, I was minutes away from death. All caused by morphine, it damaged my kidneys so much that the Naval team put me down from 55 tablets a day down to 22.

After I stopped them, via a drug given to druggies (which was horrendous) I actually felt better, as the morphine subdues any organ in the body.

PLEASE be careful, (((( hugs ))))

[floozy]

thank s, my latest patch only lasted overnight on my skin before everywhere it touched burnt me again . ive since been in bed feeling very poorly since monday evening ,

[gypsycrafter]

I had pain patches 7 years ago but do not remember their content. I was allergic to the sticky stuff that holds the patch in place as the bit in the centre was not red! They are talking about patches again but I did not know you could have morphine that way. I hope they do not give me "cotton wool Head" like the tabs do! hope you sort your problem out.

[hevs]

I was on those patches and like you they did provide some much needed relief from the pain...after a few weeks i also developed an allergy to the patch itself...burning and blistering everywhere the patch had touched my skin....I was taken off them immediately but was not given anything else to replace them...now i am on gabapentin 900g 3 times a day....do they help?...no not much!!

[floozy]

thanks for sharing , ive been told i can have a morphine pill to put under my tounge but im worried if im allergic to the patch would i be allergic to the tablet too .? ive had a really bedridden week , feeling so poorly i think it was more than a flare up this time . i take lyrica 300mg , paracetamol 4000 mg daily , but ive just been put back on statins for high cholesterol and that tends to make me achey on top of the fm .

[janetbrown]

I took them for a long time they were brilliant at first but i ended up addiced to morphine and found i needed more and more nothing was helping the pain in the end.i would think you are better to try something else just think you have to get used to living with the pain as i find nothing really work's long time your body seem's to get used to everything . sounds very harsh but it's a horrible illness along with all the other thing's you get with it .

[floozy]

thanks im not going back on morphine , patches or tablets ive decided , just been reading through my pain diary and im in pain no ,matter what im taking it seems so will have to wait til the pain management team see me and see if they have any useful suggestions , thank you everyone for taking your time to share

[LindseyMid in reply to floozy]

It's good that you've kept a pain diary - it's a very good idea when trying medications!

Targeted treatments work best for any kind of pain and opioids are like putting a sticking plaster on the pain - they don't help to stop what is causing the pain, just try to stop it coming out. Hopefully, you should be able to get more effective medications for Fibro.

[floozy]

my pain diary started off as just about the pain and that was my main focus somewhere that i could have a whinge and vent off some self pity but on reading back on it , ive also created a jog to my memory that id forgotten , silly little things that have made me smile even if for a short time ive remembered my life isnt just about pain

[bonzo79]

what was the name of your patches - was it bu-trans ? as my partner has these and suffers blistering , itching red skin and ends up pulling them off ,

[floozy]

i was on bu-trans a little time ago and i couldnt stay awake so i had no quality of life at all and my skin was a little itchy and burny so he prescribed me buphrenorphine and these were fine for a while the best combination of pain relief with lyrica , paracetamol and lustral but patch site started to get itchy but i persevered with it , it was only changed once a week and when i took it off it was horrendously burnt . so when i saw a consultant medic at the hospital whilst i was being evaluated to see if i could get a place with pain management team he said i should try again but with a patch that should be changed every 4 days so i gave it a go and only lasted overnight before it was unbearable again ! i have 2 scars now dont know if it is a coincidence but since then i seem to have been very ill . and super allergic ? hope your partner finds something that helps bonzo79

[Robbo39]

My Phd told me to let the air at the patch for a few seconds before applying, to allow the alcohol to evaporate, apparantly that's what causes the itching and skin rash, I now ask my partner to apply them on my back, to prevent me from scratching, and it's working, with little or no skin itching or rash, hope you have some success with yours, then again depends on what dosage you are on.

[Marytoma234]

Yes I have had bru trans patch which caused severe reactions to which I am just going back to the gp the pain clinic gave me morphine liguid 10 mg to tak e 4 times a day my friend has this and really bad days in bed sweating losing weight I honestly am frustrated with the doctors and medication feeling like a guinea pig

[sarahwallace]

I had also been on morphine patches. They worked very well until I developed a skin allergy to both the

glue and obviously the morphine. They had been prescribed for chronic back pain due to severe advanced

degenerative discs, curve in the thoracic spine, and many probs in the cervical spine. Also osteoarthritis in

most joints. The allergy became unbearable as it was so itchy. I ended up with running sores both where

the glue and the morphine touched the skin. My G.P. was wonderful and put me on slow release tablets

twice a day. They have worked very well, and although still in pain, I can at least walk. I have heard many

stories very similar to my own but in some cases their G.P.s have refused to make the change. I cannot

understand why, as the sores get so bad, they are very clearly visible. They also can make life a misery

as it is bad enough having to put up with the pain, without having something like an entire beehive attacking

every place that a patch has been attached. I was told at one stage to use cortisone cream 1/2hr before

replacing the patch. This made the patch slip, slide and fall off within a day. That was another downfall

with the patches. There is no way, in a hot climate, that these will stay attached for 7 days. They may have

if one did not shower, try to swim, or do anything that would make one sweat. I hope I may have helped

someone in the same position.

[Diligent500]

Hi to all,

I have been given pain patches today for pain in my back n shoulder ect servre pain in shoulder as had operation n it's not worked very well.

These take quite a while to work so I've been advised to keep using my other morphine tabs too till they kick in.

I will see how effective they are this week n then see if they are ok for me

Diligent500.

[42mar]

Hi,I was put on morphine patches some 6 years ago, only thing that helps with my pain,however,I do find i scratch at the site ,even after removal,the adhesive is the main problem.

This sounds crazy my doctor prescribed a steroid INHALER to spray on the area patch is to be placed,but it works,!!

Occasionally I might be tempted to scratch,but not like before when it would itch like crazy.

Works for me, the patch i mean,I certainly know as I have left patch off on occasions the most I can go without is,3 days!!

Hope this helps you,good luck and take care, 😉