Study Reveals Doctors’ Misconceptions About Pain

Posted by azdrugrehabctr on April 21, 2016 under Addiction Trends, Prescription Drugs | Comments are off for this article

An alarming study conducted by researchers at the University of Virginia uncovered a major problem among medical students and may reveal why prescription pain medications are being overprescribed to certain kinds of patients. The study looked to find why white people are more likely to be prescribed prescription painkillers over black people.

Researchers were able to determine that many white doctors held false beliefs about black people that will likely prevent them from properly treating black patients, as well as potentially answering the question of why so many white people are addicted to prescription painkillers after being prescribed the medication for real or falsified pain.

False beliefs such as black people age more slowly than white people, black people’s skin is thicker than white people’s skin and black people’s nerve endings are less sensitive than white people’s were discovered in the study of 222 white medical students. In addition to having a significant misunderstanding about the anatomy and constitution of black people, doctors have a harder time empathizing with patients that they have less in common with.

“What we found is those who endorsed more of those false beliefs showed more bias and were less accurate in their treatment recommendations,” explained Kelly Hoffman, a UVA doctoral candidate in psychology, and leader of the study. The report was presented to the National Academy of Sciences.

This study, while alarming in the sense that medical students have such an extreme misunderstanding regarding black people, points to another question about the overwhelming amounts of prescription painkillers that are being prescribed to white patients in this country. If medical students believe that white people are more sensitive to pain, or are more in need of prescription painkillers, then they would be more apt to believe someone who is complaining of pain. Unfortunately, it has become clear that sometimes they are really just seeking out a prescription for painkillers so they can abuse them or sell them on the streets.

As more and more researchers look into the prescription painkiller problem and conduct studies about doctor’s beliefs, practices and histories it is becoming clear that a change in the medical system is needed in order to stop the prescription painkiller epidemic.