AARYAN SANWAL
HOUSE, a critically acclaimed award-winning television
series portrays a brilliant but rather unsociable diagnostician named Gregory
House. He is the head of the Department of Diagnostic Medicine and deals with
cases that other doctors and clinicians are unable to diagnose. While undergoing
a surgical procedure, an infarction in his right legs’ quadriceps resulted in
him having severe pain in his leg and rendered him unable to walk without a
stick. To manage the severe and increasing pain, he started taking Vicodin.
Over time his tolerance towards the drug started building up and at a certain point
in the series, he consumed –Vicodin – pills that were supposed to last a month
in less than a week. This blog post will
look at the accuracy of the depiction of opioid dependence and its effects in
the show.
Gregory House’s dependence on Vicodin starts small and
then slowly becomes a full-blown problem. While dealing with a hypochondriac
patient who comes into the clinic, House prescribes him Vicodin and gets the
same from the pharmacy but switches out the drug for mint pills and keeps it
for himself. Even though he is a doctor and has a prescription for the drug
itself, the fact that he engages in such behavior shows very early on in the
show that his need for the drug is high.
In a later episode, House’s colleague, Dr. Cuddy bets
him that he cannot go a week without Vicodin and it is important to note that
during this time a lot of his colleagues and juniors have told him that he
abuses Vicodin and should stop but House denies all of it. House accepts the
bet and does well for the first three days but on the fourth day after a lot of
work and being under intense pain House breaks the bones in his hands with a
large paperweight to release endorphins in his body and also as a way to divert
the pain from his leg. The next day, he starts vomiting and when questioned
about it lies and says that it was from the pain and not the withdrawal.
Finally, at the end of the week, House agrees that he abuses Vicodin and goes
back on the medicine but says that it allows him to be a better doctor and that
is worth it. Opioid dependence, as defined by the Diagnostic and
Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition (DSM-IV), is
characterized by physical dependence on opioids and loss of control over opioid
use. This can be clearly seen in House when in order to get his dose of Vicodin
tablets he forges the signature of his colleague despite knowing that
prescription fraud is a punishable offence. This behaviour goes to show that he
is severely dependent on Vicodin and cannot function without it.
House is seen popping pills like candy and this earns
him a reputation of being an addict and subsequently gets him in trouble with
the police and only after he is put in jail, he agrees to go to rehab. While
this works for him for a while, he soon relapses into his old dependency and is
right back where he started and only worse this time. This goes to show that opioid
dependency can affect anyone and even people in the healthcare industry who are
supposed to know the effects of certain drugs.
The use of certain opioids such as OxyContin and
Vicodin in the U.S. health industry came in the 1990’s after receiving approval
from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Pharmaceutical companies assured people
in the healthcare services to prescribe opioids and led them to believe that
there were no disadvantages of the same. Initial adverts for OxyContin – an opioid
– said that, “It’s not hypnotic, and there’s no danger
of acquiring a habit.” (Miroff, 2019). These claims in hindsight were
absolutely false and were made by the sales representatives to promote the
usage of these drugs. “In a settlement reached on 22 December,
Purdue Pharma, maker of OxyContin agreed to pay $24m to settle a lawsuit by the
state (Kentucky) that alleged that the company had concealed the highly
addictive nature of the opioid and encouraged doctors who were not trained in
pain management to prescribe its formulation”. (McCarthy, 2015).
The
depiction of opioid dependency in HOUSE is shown very well and more than that,
it is accurate. It shows the various stages, the effects, the treatment methods
available and does a good job of showcasing a problem that was and still is
prevalent in many U.S. states due to foolish and rash decisions taken by the FDA
and the pharmaceutical companies.
REFERENCES
Miroff, N. (2019, April 1). From Teddy Roosevelt to Trump: How drug
companies triggered an opioid crisis a century ago. Retrieved October 30, 2019,
from
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2017/09/29/the-greatest-drug-fiends-in-the-world-an-american-opioid-crisis-in-1908/.
McCarthy, M. (2015). Companies to pay $39.5m in OxyContin and Risperdal
cases. British Medical Journal, 351. doi: 10.1136/bmj.h7018
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