I recently commented on an AusDoc article about the weaning of long-term opiates in which I, and many others, agreed that people should not be forced to tolerate severe pain due to our community becoming judgmental about opiate use.

Within days, I heard about yet another study purporting to show that opiates are no better than placebo for “acute back pain”.

Recently published in The Lancet, the trial from the OPAL group is entitled ‘Opioid analgesia for acute low back pain and neck pain (the OPAL trial): a randomised placebo-controlled trial’.