[Increased sensitivity to pain in long-term opioid treatment]

Recent years have seen a rise in the prescription of strong opioids for chronic and even subthreshold forms of pain. Animal and human experiments and clinical observations have shown that, compared to placebos, chronic opioid administration results in not only tolerance to its analgesic effects but also in heightened pain sensitivity. Therefore chronic, especially high-dose, opioid treatment can not be recommended for chronic pain but is instead contraindicated. Patients on long-term opioids will often reject proposals to withdraw the drug. Important elements of treatment are patient education, empathy and unconditional acceptance by the patient, motivation enhancement and psychological support, collaboration with other prescribers and therapists, detoxification, measures to increase pain tolerance, encouragement of general health behavior and salutotherapy, treatment of the primary illness, and prescription of participation oriented alternative analgesics.