Over the past year, America has come face to face with a horrifying pandemic — COVID-19. The pandemic revealed concerning statistics regarding a disproportionate burden of COVID-19 on minorities both in terms of being more susceptible to contracting the virus as well as having less access to care and treatment, especially Black and Latino communities.
At the sound of three bones breaking in perfect sequence as my ski-boot-covered foot slammed onto the ground, my adventure day at Squaw Valley turned disastrous. I was never the student to break the “no skiing, no snowboarding” rule of dental school. Now, one surgery later, I found myself in excruciating pain and unable to walk.
Imagine it is 2 a.m., and you are cramming for your pharmacology exam. You flip through the hundreds of flashcards you created to memorize the properties of the medications and corresponding treatment protocol. You come across analgesics, specifically opioids, and remember they are used to alleviate pain. In school, we learn about the properties and proper dosages of the drugs we will one day prescribe, as well as how to address potential concerns of usage with our patients, but in order to enhance our own patient care mentality, we should reframe how we think about pain management overall.
