[apg72]

Thank you for the reply BT1978. I checked the box this evening and there are now 5 full blister packs left whereas last night when I checked there were 7 full blister packs in the box. I also found another empty box with a date on which was 15/7/20. These are the same tablets, zapain 30mg/500mg x 100. By my calcs she is taking at least 8 per day and the GP is freely writing prescriptions for 100 tablets every 12 days or so as the date on the newest box was 27/7/20. Can you get addicted from taking 8 a day over a long period?

You may be right with the vomiting as I know she ran out during lockdown. I was asked to buy them for her over the counter as I’ve been picking up prescriptions for some people in isolation but I made excuses that the queue was too big as I didn’t want to help feed a possible addiction. So there probably was a period where she didn’t have any in the house.

The trouble with asking her to contact her GP and have a tapering plan sorted is that I don’t actually think she believes she has an addiction to codeine as she’s previously denied it. So if she doesn’t think she has a problem then it’s unlikely that she is going to admit to them that she’s addicted and ask for a tapering plan to be put in place.

I’m going to try monitoring how many she is taking and when she goes to the chemist to pick up her prescription and keep a journal. I’ve started it already. At least that way I can confront her in a few weeks with some hard evidence to try and make her see she may have a codeine addiction.

If you can think of anything else I can do to try and track how many she is taking then that would be appreciated. In an ideal world, they should be available by prescription ONLY and prescribed for short periods of time. The wording on this box I have here states “Do not take for longer than directed by your prescriber as taking codeine regularly for a long time can lead to addiction” What constitutes a long time? I know when purchased over the counter the pharmacist says take for THREE days only and the dosage is lower. That leads me to think why are prescription drugs which are much stronger treated different? It seems so wrong and is making people addicted especially when GP’s just want to get rid of you by writing you another repeat prescription for 100 when you run out. It beggars belief!

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