This would be basically why after breaking my hip and having it reassembled around a Dynamic Hip Screw, every week I dropped my dose of codeine so that the pain was back to being as bad as I&#x27;d been dealing with a week ago. I do wish people being prescribed opiates for situations where that&#x27;s possible (i.e. the pain will lessen over time anyway) basically got a guide on doing that, not everybody&#x27;s an ornery bastard like I am.<p>The only time opiates for control of pain that wasn&#x27;t going to lessen over time seems like a good idea is in the case of palliative care for the dying; my father got several months of mostly-pain-free end of life out of it, and whether it was increased pain from the cancer or decreased effectiveness due to addiction that eventually meant the maximum dose allowable didn&#x27;t help, he was dead within a week after that so even given all the obvious caveats I think he picked the right set of trade-offs.