I agree with you 100%!! It is people like that who make it so hard for people like me and others who suffer with chronic pain!! We despertly need to recieve proper treatment and we can't!!

My chronic pain was undertreated for several years because of trash like this! Thank God for pain pumps.

Cheers
Patsy W

What a story. I can't believe the nerve of some people. I was just watching the news where a guy gets his pain medications mailed to him. He wasn't getting them (he called the pharmacy, they said they were mailed, he was going into withdrawals) so he set up a camera, suspecting the mailman was stealing them, and voila, there it was on camera - the mailman stealing his medications.

What some people will do to get medications that they don't need and to steal from someone who does is deplorable.

Cath

The doctor at the ER did the right thing..
It is unbelievable some of the stories you hear about. Because of my wife's profession and my close interaction with many doctors/nurses, I hear so much.

What amazes me is that there are people coming into the ER with headaches and demanding strong narcotics to help them! And as you said when they are refused, they get angry (and sometimes violent)

That tells me two things:

1 - There are too many people looking towards the medical field to 'give them their fix' to their addiction.

2 - Pain tolerance. I dont know about some of the other things you have seen in the ER, but just in general, at PT, Aqua Therapy, etc I hear and see people talking about the level of dosage of pain medications that they HAVE to HAVE. Yet, I see them walking around fine, talking about all their physical activities. Something is wrong here.

Drug Seekers not only waste the time of medical professionals, they make it harder for people that need medications to get them.

I agree with everything said! Dilauro - I would love for my WC to cover aqua therapy again! That was the best part (if there is such a thing) after fusion surgery.

Keith

I was in the medical field before my life was turned upside down by an accident, but do I remember those "frequent flyers"! As a social worker at the hospital I dealt with a lot of the complains and the "needs" of these people! They took valuable time from my day that I needed to deal with patients with real needs away from me, the Doctor's and administrators, we had one girl that use to go through every freaking hospital in our town, and if it was not Fybromyalgia (which she didn't have), or Endo, it was the fall that she had in her driveway that was icy, it was the worst!

EMS, I feel for you, and for those of you that are the 1st line of help out there, specially when you know what they are up to, and the valuable time that they are making you and everyone else waste, it sucks!

I think everyone who has to take or wants to take strong pain meds should have to take a lie detector test lol I would be happy to take one

But seriously the medical system needs to come up with something to weed out the jerks!

My hubby used to be a medic and said even the "little old ladies/men" are doing this crap.

And it sucks to be treated like one when you go to the ER in acute excruciating pain and have to wait for hours in a room because some admitting nurse deems you a drug seeker and then ask you "what do you want us to do about it?" While I am crying from the pain. The doctor that saw me knew I was in pain-he was the only person that wrote on my medical records I might have a herniated disc, told me to wear a collar and gave my PCP instructions that I needed an MRI. He also ordered 4 injections-morphine, decadron, tramadol ansd another I can't remember. The MRI revealed I had severe compression at C5-6.

BTW-after my lawyer goes after the guy that rear ended me he plans on looking over my files for medical negligence. I was treated very badly by that one hospital-the other one here was the one that referred me to a Neurosurgeon. The other hospital had some 3rd rate PA examine me at their spine center who said I wasn't a candidate for surgery.

I am one angry person and think I suffered needlessly because I was deemed a drug seeker which I wasn't.

I'm a strong believer that the medical profession needs to educate (better educate) those who do initial screenings to weed out the people with real issues from those with "not so real" issues.

The use of pharmaceutical reference systems like KASPER which is used in KY to see the history of your medications statewide (so long as the prescription was written in KY or surrounding counties) can help show that a person has a true medical condition based on their history. If time permits, surveilance can prove to help weed out seekers. When someone is truely hurting, they usually don't go from laying on the floor yelling in pain to sitting up laughing with someone.

Most people in real pain also don't rate their pain as a "10" while still being able to walk, talk and jump up on an exam table or with a straight face.

When I see someone who has their breath taken away simply by taking a step a certain way or being slightly moved, I can usually tell their not faking. There are other subtle things to watch for while the patient is in your care. I am probably more sensitive to it since I've unfortunately been there myself.

There are times that folks who are in true pain get labeled as seekers, but unfortunately it still goes back to those who create doubt by faking to simply get medications.

... in comparison to the drug abusers and doctors who run pill mills. The PM docs who hand out meds like they're candy. It's not just addicts walking into the ER.

Take a look at the laundry list of drugs some people on here post about and compare notes on. You don't have to look very far.

Sadly all of them cause the insurance industries and the criminal justice system to go nuts. The only ones happy about it are the pharma companies who sell more Oxcyontin and Percocet than Mars does M&Ms.

EMS - I followed that nasty drug issues down your way pretty close and I thought they had taken a huge chunk out of it, as in closed up a LOT of "shops"???

There are so many problem areas, it's taking a while to get them all. And, as you know our legal systems - nothing moves fast!

EMS Guy,

If I understand it right. You, the hospital, can't tell a drug seeker to take a hike. The law says you can't refuse treatment? So to get around it you just give drug seekers some tylenol and send them packing?

Is there no way you can just call them out and tell them to get out of your ER? Is there a "list" that local or state that you can put these patients names on so other hospitals know they are just being scammed?

Sadly the pill mill business is booming because it's so lucrative. There are some tracking systems to help hunt down these places. Hopefully with stiff penalties of big jail time other docs can be scared into doing the right thing instead of going for the easy money.

In EMS we can choose not to give any pain medication. As far as the hospitals are concerned, the law says they have to treat life threatning conditions. Pain management isn't really technically life threatning (although it can seem that way). Now, if there were signs of cardiac issues as a result of pain like pain induced SVT (or other issues similarly related), then that's another story.

Our local hospital is very good about sending the seekers out with nothing. Not even a tylenol. I'm sure some of the nurses on this site can explain the hospital regs better than I can.

Keith

They should start with the doctors and nurses. I arrested enough of them before on traffic stops for illegal narcotics, other times stealing patient meds, etc. Before judging anyone, they should look at their own field first. Like any profession, there are good and bad. I fortunately have a great doctor.