'I can't keep track of all the pills they offered me': NBA star Grant Hill who suffered 11 surgeries describes how he found alternative therapies to avoid the tsunami of highly-addictive

Grant Hill was pegged as the next Michael Jordan before his ankle went.
He endured 11 grueling surgeries, including one that almost killed him, before he admitted defeat and hung up his 33 jersey, becoming arguably the biggest 'what if?' in NBA history.

But for years, he refused to take no for an answer. For years he was willing to try anything. Short of a magic pill to undo the impossible, he was offered modern medicine's closest alternative: opioids.

'I can't keep track of all the pills they offered me, all the names. I had so many surgeries you need three hands to count them,' he explains.

Like millions of Americans, Hill accepted that the highly-addictive painkillers were part and parcel of his procedure and recovery in his first 10 operations.

Unlike millions of Americans, he never wedded himself to the drugs, which have claimed so many lives that overdoses are now the leading cause of death for under-50s in the United States. This is partly to do with the fact that he suffered a severe allergic reaction to the combination of two opioids after one of his operations ('I can't remember which one, they all blur into one after a while').

But as the nation's drug addiction epidemic reaches new traumatic heights, the now-44-year-old star is speaking out about his harrowing experience with the heavy duty medication in a bid to encourage patients to seek alternative therapies.

'It's really personal for me. I had a lot of surgeries and exposure to opioids during my process, and I had no idea about the issues with overuse,' he told Daily Mail Online.

'I didn't depend on those drugs. But every time I used them, I never felt quite good. I didn't like the way they made my stomach feel. You just feel off, and it takes a while to get back to feeling good.

'We're accustomed to follow the physician's orders and decisions, but you need to know that it's important to take ownership of your health, and ask the important questions.'
Today, as Hill shares his story, a new report has been published revealing the monumental scale of opioid prescriptions post-surgery in America.

The report by healthcare data cruncher QuintilesIMS Institute found nine in 10 patients are exposed to opioids to manage postsurgical pain, with each person receiving an average of 85 pills each.

According to the report, a 10 percent reduction in surgery-related opioid prescribing would cut the amount of unused pills in the US by 332 million a year, with 300,000 fewer addicts. It would also save $830 million.

Currently, overprescribing of painkillers after surgical operations results in 3.3 billion unused pills flooding into communities on a yearly basis.