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Nicholas Warlin

Professor Stephanie Maenhardt

English 1010

18 March 2019

How To Effectively Generate Sympathy

Imagine waking up in the morning and getting to work on time. Your day is going well,

all your work is done, but you start to feel a burning pain in your back that keeps growing more

and more intense. Suddenly you’re in unbearable pain as your body seizes up and you fall to the

floor. This is exactly what happened to the author Kate M. Nicholson and she was left being

unable to sit or stand and could only walk short distances. After trying multiple treatments, she

turned to prescription opioids, which were able to allow her to function in her daily routines

again. Luckily, she was able to fully recover after time but lots of pain patients are left in this

position forever. Today you hear about advertisements on the television and on billboards

demonizing the use of prescription opioids because they have the potential for dependency and

abuse, which can lead to a fatal overdose if too much is taken. The government has attempted to

curb an appearing pandemic of prescription opioid overdoses by recommending prescribers a

new method of prescribing, which severely cuts down the number of opioids they prescribe.

Nicholson’s article contributes a voice in this era that attempts to speak up for the patients whose

prescription opioid treatment is being downsized because of these new prescribing guidelines. In

her article “Clampdown on Opioids Is Hurting Pain Patients” uses personal stories, accounts

from physicians and patients, and statistics to establish her credibility. Her appeals to ethos and

pathos persuade the reader to sympathize for the suffering of pain patients as the government

continues to tighten regulations on prescribing pain medications.

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In the article "Clampdown on Opioids Is Hurting Pain Patients" by Kate M. Nicholson,

she starts her article off with a story about how she collapsed at work one day with unbearable

pain and was on and off pain medications for the next 20 years until advancements were able to

save her. This is currently the problem that many Americans face in their day, and the federal

government is starting to severely limit the prescribing of pain medications by physicians. The

article looks at both sides of the argument, from the government trying to limit abuse, to the

people abusing medications, and tries to point out that the goal should be to help the everyday

patient in the middle.

Nicholson’s article was written at the beginning of 2019, about three years after the

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released their revised prescribing recommendations

that included previsions for stopping a growing pandemic of opioid overdoses. This has allowed

most prescribers time to review and change their methods for evaluating pain and to adjust their

prescribing habits accordingly. Kate M. Nicholson is a civil rights attorney that looks at cases

relating to this matter because these clients are going through the same pain that she once

experienced. Due to so many clients’ pain medications being limited, they have had to cut back

on work or quit entirely because they cannot manage their pain anymore. Therefore, she wrote an

article to be published in the Los Angeles Times to attempt to reach out to lawmakers or

lobbyists to sympathize with these pain patients and to maybe create a petition to evaluate these

recommendations and reconsider their stance. I personally have some experience in the matter

because even though I have not had to take these medications, I work in a pharmacy and see the

affected patients come in every day suffering from the limit of medication and turning to

alternative methods of pain management such as muscle relaxers or benzodiazepines. Therefore,

I agree with Nicholson’s argument and sympathize with these patients.

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Nicholson in her article introduces one of her clients as an example of what happens as

the government regulates prescribing pain medication.

One such patient, Maria Higginbotham, has had more than a dozen surgeries to

correct the collapse of her spine. She suffers from a painful condition in which the

spinal cord fuses with adjacent membranes. Last year, her physician cut her pain

medication by 75%, explaining that the reduction was to comply with federal

guidelines. (Nicholson)

Obviously, she is distraught that the government’s recommendation on prescribing pain

medications would force a doctor to cut down medication for a patient that obviously needs it.

This is an effective use of pathos as it uses an emotional story to reinforce Nicholson’s message

to sympathize with the patient and to be upset at the government’s regulations.

Nicholson introduces this quote from the Center of Disease Control in her article “The

CDC's National Center for Health Statistics estimates that 50 million Americans have pain every

day and nearly 20 million have pain that limits major life activities” (Nicholson). She wanted the

audience to feel shock at the fact that so many people in the US must live with everyday pain and

so many of them can’t even do their daily tasks without he uses of pain medication. This is an

effective use of logos as the regulation of pain medication by the government has severe

consequences for patients that need this medication, generating sympathy from the audience and

reinforcing Nicholson’s credibility.

Nicholson uses this quote from a physician to show how they’re being affected by

government regulations. “You set yourself up for a liability, even when you know they're not

addicted and they're benefiting from opioids" (Nicholson). She also states that “Other doctors

said they had stopped treating pain patients altogether--even patients who don't use prescription
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opioids” (Nicholson). This goes to show that these regulations are not only affecting patients, but

also prescribers as their licenses are in danger if they prescribe anything different from what the

federal guidelines are. Nicholson even states in her article that these regulations are

recommendations, but they still must be followed to the letter. Her use of pathos by including

these statements helps to generate sympathy from the audience which helps to solidify her

credibility.

I noticed that Nicholson’s use of the word “Clampdown” in the title of her article gives a

more aggressive tone to what the CDC is doing. The CDC acts like their recommendation is only

meant to be taken lightly and experimented with, while Nicholson states that “Increasingly, the

guidelines are treated not as recommendations but as one-size-fits-all mandates. They are being

misapplied by physicians, state legislatures, insurers and Medicaid programs” (Nicholson). I

believe the term clampdown, defined as “the act or action of making regulations and restrictions

more stringent” from Merriam-Webster is a perfect fit for the title of the article. It is logical and

correct in its use and helps hook in readers to the article because it sounds somewhat aggressive

and vindictive as if the government is trying to hurt pain patients.

The way Nicholson starts off her article with a personal story about how she went from

perfectly functional to disabled in a split second from a surgical mishap is such a strong use of

pathos. It grabs the attention of the reader because it is something that could happen to anybody.

This introduction coupled with the story of her recovery and how she got lucky is intended to

somewhat scare the audience, but also to help them relate and sympathize for her. Using this, she

can shift this sympathy to others like her and to all pain patients and to create a call to action

against the CDC for their prescribing recommendations.

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Using the accounts of patients and physicians alike, I believe that Kate M. Nicholson

successfully attempts to persuade her audience to sympathize for pain patients and to shift blame

to the CDC and the government for their prescribing recommendations. Personally, I believe this

article is very well written, as I can see a very minimal amount of fallacies within her logic.

Nicholson evaluates the problem with somewhat of a bias, but reasonably concludes that the

government may need to change their stance in order to effectively manage pain medications and

not hurt the patient at the same time. Many patients die from the misuse and abuse of opioid

medications, but many more are hurt by the government’s limit of prescription pain medications.
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Works Cited

Nicholson, Kate M. "Clampdown on Opioids is Hurting Pain Patients." Los Angeles Times, 18

Jan. 2019, pp. A.11. SIRS Issues Researcher, sks-sirs-com.libprox1.slcc.edu.