The only thing I can comment on is my own experiences with pain relief medication for Osteoarthritis, for a fortnight I felt like I couldn't wake up – along with a feeling of disconnection from reality. During the third week this passed leaving me with the beneficial affects without which I could not carry on working and I'm glad I give the meds a chance.

Guy

Geoff,

I would recommend you talk to your Doctor rather than seek medical advice on this forum. He or she may have other medication you can move on to that is more suitable for you for example.

Long term home treatment with aspirin is known to induce the risk of stomach ulcers and bleeding and is generally, not regarded favourably by the medical profession either.

Regards Brian

It's a bit awkward with some medications. I had a mild heart attack almost 5 years ago and was put on, amongst other things, 75mg aspirin as, I think, a blood thinning agent. Or was it to reduce clotting? Dunno. At the same time I was already on Lansoprazole 15mg from a much earlier problem involving mefenamic acid (Ponstan) and an irritated stomach so the heart people doubled that dose. A few months later, one of my GP's reduced it back down to 15mg. No problems so far as far as I know. But what do you do? Cease the aspirin to protect the stomach and risk problems with the heart? I think I prefer to risk the stomach.

Recently, I've been diagnosed with lung cancer and been put on a chemotherapy tablet which has a list of possible side effects as long as my arm. So far, most of the oddities which have happened are things that have happened before. So what is it? Chemotherapy? Or other things? I tend towards the view that since they are minor, a careful watching brief is indicated, especially as I'm more concerned about possible cancer reduction.

Another one is Codeine. Again, I recently ended up with 60mg every 4 hours of the stuff. (Ok, the problem that caused it was cleared within 5 days with codeine usage decreasing over the 5 days.) But a major problem was constipation. So I ended up on three separate drugs to clear the logjam. Took a few days but they worked and I immediately stopped their use. But again, what do you do? Suffer the pain, or take the drug and suffer the, in this instance, the constipation?

Makes one think, does it not.

Peter G. Shaw

Don't know what's worse, having a log jam or hitting the wall in back of the loo. Swear it's almost going supersonic.

Got to 70 and got 'called in' for the free inspection.

Height, weight, etc, all ok.

Was given a huge bag of 'low dose' aspirin and told to take one a day ,until I died.

" What for" ?

"just do it".

Three days later I thought I was bleeding to death when on the loo.

Bag of Aspirin consigned to reach River Humber, bleeding stopped.