Love hurts. Surgery hurts more. To dim the pain of post-surgery pain, Western medicine provides lots of options. Now come researchers from the University of Oxford with a kind of scientists' guide to post surgery pain meds. The New York Times reports that the researchers, who reviewed about 350 randomized trials of oral pain medications used after surgery, found reliable results for 46 drug doses and combinations. They defined a drug or combination as effective if it provided 50 percent pain relief for four to six hours after a single dose, compared with placebos. They found that among the most effective drugs for the largest number of people were ketoprofen, which is sold as Orudis; 600 milligrams of ibuprofen; 1,200 milligrams of aspirin; and combinations of Tylenol with either ibuprofen, codeine or oxycodone. Codeine alone and lower doses of ibuprofen were largely ineffective. The Times reports that of the analgesics you can get over the counter, the best combination is ibuprofen and Tylenol  200 milligrams of ibuprofen and 500 of Tylenol has a 74 percent success rate.
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Saturday, May 31, 2025