Opioids are the most effective drugs available for pain, said Dr. Norm Buckley. (Toby Talbot/Associated Press)

Ontario's new strategy to restrict inappropriate use of opioid painkillers like OxyContin could discourage doctors from prescribing them when needed, leaving patients with chronic pain to suffer needlessly, pain experts say.

The province announced recently it will start tracking painkillers known as opioids — such as oxycodone, morphine and codeine — as well as stimulants and sedatives.

But doctors who specialize in controlling pain say while abuse is a problem, the undertreatment of pain by withholding opioids is worse.

When people are left in pain, the cost to society eclipses cancer and HIV in terms of lost hours, productivity and cost of care, said Dr. Norm Buckley, chair of the department of anesthesia at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ont.

Anticonvulsants and antidepressants are effective pain control options, but Buckley said opioids such as morphine and OxyContin work best.

"Opioids are still far and away the most effective drugs we have for pain, and they should be used to a greater extent," said Buckley, who is also director of the Michael G. DeGroote National Pain Centre at McMaster.

"But at the same time you have outside observers looking at it and saying, 'People are going crazy prescribing opioids. We have to do something about that!'"

Tracking opioid use as Ontario is proposing could provide useful information, Buckley acknowledged.

In Quebec, opioid use doubled over 14 years, said Kristen Reidel, a master's student in epidemiology at Montreal's McGill University.

When Reidel presented her findings on opioid prescribing trends in Quebec at the World Congress on Pain in Montreal this week, she said she didn't find an increase for the youngest age group.

Rather, the highest increase in opioid use was among people over the age of 80, who tend to suffer more chronic pain.

"It's too bad that so many patients are penalized and suffer in a useless manner, because we are afraid of addiction," said Reidel's supervisor, Manon Choinière, a clinical scientist affiliated with the anesthesiology department at the University of Montreal.

Opioid addiction is rare in people with no history of drug or alcohol abuse, Choinière said.

With files from CBC's Loreen Pindera