I have spoken to several medical doctors and I will agree most don't want you to take Vicodin for an extended period but most understand how living with terrible chronic pain is and give it to you. I have read quite a bit on both and can't agree that Vicodin is more harmful than marijuana. Marijuana burns up your brain cells. What does Vicodin do that is more harmful than that? I agree Vicodin is habit forming and addictive but smoking pot is also habit forming and addictive and far more mind altering.
The term "Narcotic" is used by many like it's the greatest evil that ever faced us. While it does have side effects (every medicine has side affects) I'm not convinced it's any worse than at least 3/4 of any other medicines out there. I also have real high blood pressure and went through numerous medicines (at least 20) before they found something that worked and didn't have a bad side affect. I take 2 BP meds a day and have more side effects (constant lung congestion) from them than taking Vicodin.
Just so no one misunderstands I'm not trying to say taking Vicodin is the best thing to do or it's not harmful, just saying it's not this great evil it's made out to be. In my case it works the best and has the least side affects of any pain relief drug I've used. If I need to drive somewhere and my back is hurting I can take a Vicodin (I take 5-325's) or 2 with no mind altering affects. You can't smoke a joint and do that.
Here's a quote from Wikipedia on narcotics
Here's the full article I took it from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcotic
Just my .02