Broken leg - pain relief

[Jammymare]

Hello, I had an open fracture of my tibia and fibula operated and pinned on Saturday and was discharged home yesterday. I’m struggling to keep on top of the pain. I’ve been given codeine 30mg and told to take 1-2 every 4-6 hours. In hospital I was getting Oramorph also and I’m sure paracetamol was given alongside the codeine.
It’s not severe pain but it’s almost all consuming as I’m unable to do much to distract myself from it. Is. there anything I can take alongside the codeine? I can’t get myself to a pharmacy to speak to anyone in person and don’t want to trouble the ward as they were rather busy.

You can take paracetamol as normal as long as it is just codeine and not co-codamol that you are taking.

When I smashed my leg to pieces the GP prescribed tramadol for the first few weeks to help with pain relief and it really did. Give your GP a ring and see what pain relief they suggest could help.

If you're non-ambulatory the pharmacy can help with prescriptions being collected and dropped off. There may be a fee, but it's probably worth it.

Hope your recovery goes well.

I would ring your GP or pharmacy for advice. I'm fairly sure i took paracetamol with codeine. Codeine made me terribly constipated to the point that the pain and discomfort from that was worse than the post surgery pain it was prescribed to relieve!

Are you taking dihydrocodeine 30mgs? If so its 8 max in 24 hours.

If its co-codamol you're already getting paracetamol with codeine.

Unless you've been told not to you can take both paracetamol and ibuprofen as well.

Some times having a hot drink after your tablet it can help them kick in quickly.

Ring your GP for advice. Not much more OTC than Codeine and paracetamol. You can also have Ibuprofen but not sure it’s recommended with fractures etc.

I broke my leg and they discharged me with Oramoroh. I did’t take it but that might be an option if your Gp agrees to write you a script.

ice packs and elevate the leg above your heart. so tons of pillows
ice packs really do help a lot.

Tramadol's great. I was prescribed it after my back surgery and I felt really good. Happy, even. And no pain. Only problem was that I couldn't take it at night because it kept me awake.

Call your GP. They'll be the only people who can prescribe anything stronger than paracetamol.

Tramadol was my friend when I broke my leg and had surgery. Mine didn’t break the skin, but like yourself I broke my tib and fib in three places and had two metal plates and nineteen screws.
I had my leg up most of the time.
Be warned, tramadol will make you very sleepy too, so you’ll be up all hours and asleep at silly times.

Thanks everyone I’ll be ringing my GP in the morning. Took paracetamol with the codeine at bedtime and managed to sleep through to 1:30am which is an improvement!

Oramorph feels good at the time but the withdraw is nasty and gives you bad constipation.