He asks, too, about their use of tobacco, alcohol, cannabis and other nonprescription drugs. “Patients tend to not want to disclose this, but I put it in a health context,” Dr. Han said. He tells them, “As you get older, there are physiological changes and your brain becomes much more sensitive. It can put you at risk.”That’s how he learns that someone complaining about insomnia might be using stimulants, possibly methamphetamines, to get going in the morning. Or that a patient who has long taken an opioid for chronic pain has run into trouble with an added prescription for, say, gabapentin.

---

Persons: Benjamin Han, Dr, Han Organizations: School of Medicine, University of California Locations: San Diego