Medication should only be taken as prescribed by your doctor !

This is a current CVS Health TV commercial.. about their “programs that encourage people to take their medication… ”

About half way thru the 30 second commercial there is a line across the bottom of the screen that says MEDICATION SHOULD ONLY BE TAKEN AS PRESCRIBED BY YOUR DOCTOR

So where does those CVS Health Pharmacists come up with refusing to fill those legit/on time/medically necessary Rxs…  Questioning the amount/numbers of meds.. prescribed by your prescriber… is too much/too high…

According to their commercial HEALTH IS EVERYTHING !

They even changed their name to include the work “HEALTH” that it is so important to them and their mission statement…

 

Is this intentional or unintentional ?

This was posted on a pharmacy Facebook page this past week..

We caught one last week. She had 2 more scripts in her car with matching IDs and insurance cards. Oh and about $700 cash

http://bostonglobe.com/metro/2012/10/04/blackstone-man-pleads-guilty-stealing-identities-forging-prescriptions/0g7F9SyrIz5pLuqygOIAHP/story.html

From the article:

John Tropea, 59, pleaded guilty Wednesday in Suffolk Superior Court to 76 charges of identity fraud, 76 charges of obtaining drugs by fraud, 40 counts of making false health care claims, and conspiracy.

I recently posted how easy it is to get a faked driver’s license  https://www.pharmaciststeve.com/?p=6883

and how a large large hospital complex had patient medical records hacked  https://www.pharmaciststeve.com/?p=6875

Then there is Pres Obama admitting that the war on drugs is a failure   https://www.pharmaciststeve.com/?p=6895

If you were in law enforcement… fighting the war on drugs… wouldn’t you be concerned about all of these incidents showing up.. that is.. if you were in law enforcement and you were actually fighting the war on drugs… or just making sure that there was legal drugs are getting diverted to the street.. to insure that there is a reason to continue fighting the war ?

There is some 12 K people that work for the DEA at the federal level.. not to mention all those dedicated to fighting this war at the state/county/city level..  Who believes that all of those people are so friggin stupid.. they can’t see this pattern ?

 

 

Pres Obama admits war on drug is a failure

In watching this video.. about half way.. there is a sound bite  of Pres Obama stating that the war on drugs is a FAILURE and that he is not going to change anything.  A 51 billion dollar a year FAILURE… I guess just another SOCIAL WAR that we are not able to win or even make an progress in.. so we just continue funding it… You know what Einstein said about INSANITY !

You stop contributing to society at 75 ?

Why I Hope to Die at 75     By Ezekiel J. Emanuel

In his controversial essay that appears in the October issue of The Atlantic, the prominent bioethicist Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel argues that longevity — living into your 80s, 90s and beyond — often comes at the expense of quality of life. Emanuel says he will be perfectly content if he dies at age 75.

Emanuel, the director of the Clinical Bioethics Department at the U.S. National Institutes of Health and head of the Department of Medical Ethics & Health Policy at the University of Pennsylvania, helped develop President Obama’s health care reform law. Emanuel makes it clear that he is not arguing for euthanasia or assisted suicide at a certain age.

Instead, he wants to call attention to “a simple truth that many of us seem to resist: living too long is also a loss. It renders many of us, if not disabled, then faltering and declining.” Emanuel argues that in their oldest of years, people tend to see their creative output decline and contribute less to society.

Remember when the initial discussion on Obamacare and there was rumors of “death panels”… this fellow was one of the major architect of Obamacare .. Maybe it is not so much as “pulling the plug” and NOT PUTTING THE PLUG IN.. in the first place ?

Pharmacist Asks… to many pts over medicated ?

Drugs or lifestyle changes? Are pharmacists pill-happy?

http://drugtopics.modernmedicine.com/drug-topics/news/drugs-or-lifestyle-changes-are-pharmacists-pill-happy

From the article:

It is my impression that many pharmacists are not particularly interested in the prevention of disease, preferring pharmacological solutions to lifestyle changes. For example, in my experience, many pharmacists seem to be far more interested in learning about the (often theoretical) mode of action of a new drug than they are in learning about the enormous potential of disease prevention.

Pharmacists have been taught to view disease in mechanistic and reductionistic terms involving the manipulation of molecules and cells with powerful pharmaceuticals that overwhelm the delicate processes of nature. These are biological processes that Mother Nature has had well in hand for hundreds of thousands of years.

 

New rules to help improve patient care ?

Star Ratings Explained

http://smartretailingrx.com/regulatory-public-affairs/star-ratings-explained/

From the article:

What star ratings are and why they matter to community pharmacies.

Star ratings matter a great deal to Medicare Advantage (MA) plans because these ratings affect their revenue, reimbursements and enrollment.[i] Since many of your customers are enrolled in MA and MA Prescription Drug Plans (MAPDPs) and because the care you provide as community pharmacies can affect star rating outcome measures, it pays to have a basic understanding of what they are, why they matter, and the impact your pharmacy can have on them.

CMS originally developed star ratings in 2008 as a system to help consumers compare quality among competing Medicare Advantage plans. Now, CMS is also using the star ratings as a financial incentive to reward high-quality plans with bonuses and rebates.[ii]

To help consumers select a Medicare Advantage plan, the federal government has instituted the star ratings program. Each year, every Medicare Advantage plan (Part D) is rated[iii] on a scale of 1 to 5 stars based on how well the plan performed in the following areas:

  • Helping members stay healthy
  • Managing chronic conditions
  • Members’ experience with their health plan
  • Members’ complaints or problems getting services and improvement in performance
  • Health plan’s customer service

In addition, Medicare drug plans (Part C) are rated on how well they perform on:

  • Drug plan customer service
  • Members’ complaints or problems getting services, and improvement in performance
  • Members’ experience with the drug plan
  • Patient safety and accuracy of drug pricing

In total, these ratings involve more than 50 different measures.

It will be interesting if chronic pain pts will have the same rights as others with chronic conditions or they will continue to have to fight for adequate treatment or accept being treated as “second class” patients ?

Current technology has many uses !

http://youtu.be/PL7zWqGHV70

Opiophobes in Indiana having 5th annual symposium

http://www.eventbrite.com/e/5th-annual-prescription-drug-abuse-symposium-tickets-12006548911

5th Annual Prescription Drug Abuse Symposium

Reversing the Tide of Opioid Abuse

 

Pres Obama farewell to Holder

I just watched Pres Obama’s announcing AG Holder’s resignation and he touted all Holder’s accomplishments during his nearly 6 years…

BIG ACTIONS on civil rights violations… voting rights… Native Americans, Gay community… and on and on…

The only CIVIL RIGHTS  violations that weren’t mentioned.. is those of the Americans with Disability Act… but then the war on drugs was not mentioned as well…

and Obama referred to Holder as “The People’s Attorney”… I guess that is just not ALL THE PEOPLE !

War on Drugs GENESIS… BIGOTRY ?

Harrison Narcotics Tax Act

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrison_Narcotics_Tax_Act

From the article:

“An Act To provide for the registration of, with collectors of internal revenue, and to impose a special tax on all persons who produce, import, manufacture, compound, deal in, dispense, sell, distribute, or give away opium or coca leaves, their salts, derivatives, or preparations, and for other purposes.” The courts interpreted this to mean that physicians could prescribe narcotics to patients in the course of normal treatment, but not for the treatment of addiction.

In the 1800s opiates and cocaine were mostly unregulated drugs. In the 1890s the Sears & Roebuck catalogue, which was distributed to millions of Americans homes, offered a syringe and a small amount of cocaine for $1.50.[4]

At the beginning of the 20th century, cocaine began to be linked to crime. In 1900, the Journal of the American Medical Association published an editorial stating, “Negroes in the South are reported as being addicted to a new form of vice – that of ‘cocaine sniffing’ or the ‘coke habit.'” Some newspapers later claimed cocaine use caused blacks to rape white women and was improving their pistol marksmanship. Chinese immigrants were blamed for importing the opium-smoking habit to the U.S. The 1903 blue-ribbon citizens’ panel, the Committee on the Acquirement of the Drug Habit, concluded, “If the Chinaman cannot get along without his dope we can get along without him.”

Wright also stated that “one of the most unfortunate phases of smoking opium in this country is the large number of women who have become involved and were living as common-law wives or cohabitating with Chinese in the Chinatowns of our various cities”

The opium addicts were mostly women who were prescribed and dispensed legal opiates by physicians and pharmacist for ”female problems,” probably mostly pain at menstruation, or white men and Chinese at the Opium dens. Between two-thirds and three-quarters of these addicts were women

House representative Thomas Sisson stated, “The purpose of this bill—and we are all in sympathy with it—is to prevent the use of opium in the United States, destructive as it is to human happiness and human life.”[

The drafters played on fears of “drug-crazed, sex-mad negroes” and made references to Negroes under the influence of drugs murdering whites, degenerate Mexicans smoking marijuana, and “Chinamen” seducing white women with drugs.[16][17] Dr. Hamilton Wright, testified at a hearing for the Harrison Act. Wright alleged that drugs made blacks uncontrollable, gave them superhuman powers and caused them to rebel against white authority. Dr. Christopher Koch of the State Pharmacy Board of Pennsylvania testified that “Most of the attacks upon the white women of the South are the direct result of a cocaine-crazed Negro brain”.[4]

Before the Act was passed, on February 8, 1914, The New York Times published an article entitled “Negro Cocaine ‘Fiends’ Are New Southern Menace: Murder and Insanity Increasing Among Lower-Class Blacks” by Edward Huntington Williams, which reported that Southern sheriffs had increased the caliber of their weapons from .32 to .38 to bring down Negroes under the effect of cocaine.[4][8][12]

Despite the extreme racialization of the issue that took place in the build up to the Act’s passage, the contemporary research on the subject indicated that black Americans were in fact using cocaine and opium at much lower rates than white Americans.[

The act also marks the beginning of the creation of the modern, criminal drug addict and the American black market for drugs. Within five years the Rainey Committee, a Special Committee on Investigation appointed by Secretary of the Treasury William Gibbs McAdoo and led by Congressman T. Rainey, reported in June, 1919[20] that drugs were being smuggled into the country by sea, and across the Mexican and Canadian borders by nationally established organisations[21] and that the United States consumed 470,000 pounds of opium annually, compared to 17,000 pounds in both France and Germany.[20] The Monthly Summary of Foreign Commerce of the United States recorded that in the 7 months to January 1920, 528,635 pounds of opium was imported, compared to 74,650 pounds in the same period in 1919.[20]

As a reference point.. women got the right to vote in 1920 and discrimination was outlawed by the Civil Rights act of 1964…. and the war on drugs was officially expanded with the creation of the BNDD ( Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs) in the late 1960’s… and the ADA (Americans with Disability Act) was passed in 1990 to prohibit discrimination from those who are disabled/handicapped.