Many “Baby Boomers” are concerned with keeping healthy. With good insurance and Medicare coverage, doctor’s fees and those associated with prescription meds are not a problem. ‘Baby Boomers” have no financial problem associated with medical care in New York, as well as other states around the country.  Since most physicians are not concerned with the addition of these senior citizens, Oxycontin is prescribed rather freely, primarily because they feel that they will not abuse its use. A lot of older individuals deal with excruciating pain, resulting from surgeries, breakages, or ailments like arthritis to name a few. Once they explain to their doctors the degree of pain that they have on a scale of 1 to 10, with “10” being the most severe, and they say that their pain is 9 or 10, “Oxycontin” is usually prescribed. The medical staff explains the dangers of the addiction of this powerful drug and then this older patient confidently leaves the office, never dreaming that his/her next visit will probably include asking for a refill of “Oxycontin”, thus leading to an addiction problem. The sad aspect related to this entire process, is that the thought of addiction never crosses their minds.

The worst thing about these 65+ addicts is that most addiction problems go unnoticed, since these seniors feel that they are explicitly following the instructions related to this drug.  The problem is that they are taking the drug too long. New York officials are putting a lot of the blame on the physicians for not monitoring their patients enough. Of course, these older patients should also report their addiction and/ or need for this drug when they first experience this overwhelming desire for it… Although other states in America are finding that they have a similar problem, many are not doing anything about it.  New York, however, seems to be implementing programs to help lessen these problems. Both prevention and treatment for the addiction of “Oxycontin” have been implemented by the state of New York. Now that this problem is diagnosed, positive results are in the near future…  Although there is much work to be done, progress is being made!