A patient is ready for discharge home from a lengthy hospital stay after a motor vehicle accident. The patient suffered multiple fractures and required large doses of morphine for several weeks
The nurse preparing the patient for discharge notes that the patient requests the maximum dose of the oral opioid analgesic at the exact intervals it is prescribed. The nurse is correct to suspect that what has occurred? a. Addiction
b. Compulsive drug seeking
c. Cross-tolerance
d. Drug tolerance
D
Patients who use a drug regularly develop tolerance to the drug when a dose produces a smaller response than it did initially. This patient has been on large doses of opioids for several weeks and has developed tolerance to this class of drugs. Addiction is characterized by compulsive drug seeking, which has not occurred. A patient using narcotics for severe pain is not a compulsive drug seeker. Cross-tolerance occurs when tolerance to one drug confers tolerance to another drug. The opioid analgesic for home use is in the same drug classification, so this is not cross-tolerance.
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