If you are prescribed any narcotic medication, or any medication for that matter, doctors can view your online drug database history and make a determination as to whether you are a frequent narcotic shopper or perhaps you have a valid complaint that might require a narcotic be prescribed.
(As dictated and typed by me today) PLAN: We will give him some oral narcotic medication, as well as a nonsteroidal antiinflammatory medication, as I did not find anything in the system to indicate that he was a recent narcotic shopper.
Obviously, this man was looked up in the drug database and it was presumed that since he had not had any recent narcotics he was not "shopping" for any. Too often there are those who do. As a matter of fact, prescription drug addictions are just as prevalent, or more so, than the illegal drugs you can get off the street.
While I don't live in WV, there was a recent article in the Charleston Gazette dated March 15, 2008 which is a little concerning and I'm sure this is more widespread than WV. Read on.
By Tara Tuckwiller, Staff Writer
Nine out of 10 West Virginians who died of overdoses in 2006 were killed by prescription drugs.
That's according to a new joint federal-state study in West Virginia, which attempts to figure out the recent explosion in drug overdoses here. Poisoning - mostly overdose - has suddenly become a leading cause of death for young West Virginians.
"There's a perception that because these are legal, prescribed drugs, somehow they're safer," said Aron Hall, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Service Officer for the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources.
"Our study shows that prescription drugs kill more people than illegal drugs."
A Sunday Gazette-Mail/West Virginia Public Broadcasting investigation last year made similar findings. The new study goes a step further, analyzing a West Virginia Board of Pharmacy database that is closed to reporters and the public by law.
That database keeps track of every controlled-substance prescription in the state - which doctor prescribed it, which patient takes it, and which pharmacy filled it. It shows whether the West Virginians who died were killed by drugs their doctors had prescribed.
Researchers studied 332 accidental drug overdoses in which a complete autopsy was performed, excluding suicides and the very few poisonings that weren't drug-related. Their findings are still preliminary, but they show that:
# One-third of the prescription drugs that helped to kill West Virginians were being taken by a valid prescription issued within the previous 30 days.
Just over half (53 percent) of the drugs had been prescribed to the person at some time before that.
The analysis does not show whether the people who overdosed were taking the drugs as prescribed. Also, "A lot of people had prescriptions for opioids that can cause death," Hall said. "But that's not what killed them." For example, a person might have had a prescription for oxycodone (commonly known by the brand name OxyContin), but wound up overdosing on street methadone.
# Methadone contributed to one in three deaths, more than any other drug.
However, only 10 of the overdose victims were enrolled at a methadone clinic for drug-abuse treatment. "We can't say it [clinic methadone] wasn't diverted," Hall said. "But it's not killing the people enrolled." Methadone pills prescribed by doctors for pain are another source of street methadone.
# Opioid painkillers contributed to more than four out of five of the deaths (83 percent). Methadone topped the list, followed by hydrocodone (Vicodin, Lortab) and oxycodone (OxyContin), each contributing to one in five deaths.
Morphine contributed to about one in seven deaths (14 percent) and fentanyl (Duragesic) contributed to a little less than 10 percent of deaths.
# Antianxiety drugs were the next-biggest factor. Drugs such as alprazolam (Xanax) and diazepam (Valium) contributed to 43 percent of deaths.
# Antidepressants such as paroxetine (Paxil) and fluoxetine (Prozac) contributed to a little more than 10 percent of deaths. (*as an aside, did anybody see the commercials now where paxil is link to birth defects?*)
When drugs were listed in the findings, medical examiners had determined the drugs helped to cause the death - not just that they were present in the person's body.
# Fewer than one in four of the deaths involved illegal drugs. "The whole paradigm has changed," Hall said.
Legal, prescription drugs now kill more people than illegal drugs, he said. "By that token, they're more dangerous."
The study was prompted by a February 2007 report by the Federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Hall said. It showed unintentional poisoning deaths climbed 550 percent in West Virginia between 1999 and 2004, far more than in any other state.
"We need to start keeping our prescription drugs under closer control," Hall said.
"Considering poisonings kill more people than guns now, shouldn't we be keeping our drugs in the equivalent of a locked gun cabinet?"
I would have to agree with her assessment really, and say yes, lock up the medicine cabinet! What is your opinion?
Speaking of which, if I have to open this page and hear another Irish tune I think I am going to barf!!! I love the music but it's time to move on! 
