Lessons From a Day in Court

Now this was interesting. From Sunday’s Free Lance-Star, yet another doctor faces the problem of diversion:

It is not for me to moralize and chastise you for your weakness and inability to control your various addictive type behaviors.

Unfortunately, however, I hold the requisite papers to prescribe a lot of medicines that have the potential to be addictive, and it is a grave and onerous responsibility deciding if it is appropriate to prescribe Oxycontin, Percocet, Xanax, Valium or whatever potentially habituating medicine to this or that patient.

To then find that patients are abusing that responsibility and conning me into prescribing for them, or falsifying their prescriptions, gets me fired up.

In case you were wondering why I have such a hang-up over this, this is the kind of stuff that we dealt with at DEA. Although I was never directly involved like this, you still root for the home team. This is a perfect article concerning drug diversion and abuse, and exactly why enforcement is necessary.