perhaps the gov is trying ot make it as differcult as possible so people get fed up and stop using NECESSARY drugs

Annettear: Lincoln said, "and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
It is, or has depending on your view. In nursing school we were taught to take pain seriously and provide comfort. Remember when they came out with the pain scales. Doctors were required to treat pain. At this rate soon it will be No dont you dare treat that pain, we dont talk about oain. How sad for now, even worse for the near and far future.

Bearhugs: i understand the thinking behind it. Just seems they waste resources on giving honest to goodness get this body through another day folks. Instead of targeted resouces where the problem is. Majority of the pill mills are various criminal enterprises, fake pharmacies online, etc.. The pharmacy logs your id to pick up narcotics. Do you really believe in this day an age that info is private. roflao. Hit the fraud, provide treatment, and then lets see how big of a problem is left. But they do manage to create some huge top heavy bureaucracy. Have a happy day.
Today I will be happy, repeat as needed.

Any dr can write up to three 30 days prescriptions for Schedule II meds at one office visit. Schedule II's have never been able to be called in, that I can remember and I am 62. The federal laws written in the Code Of Federal Regulations govern Prescription Drugs. Each State Legislature is responsible for laws that govern Prescription Drugs in each state. If it is not written in federal and state laws, it is a choice.

Hi, nice to meet you.

I think you might have read your state, CT's, Regs incorrectly. The Regs I read said that a Practitioner can only write a prescription once every 7 days, not give you 7 days worth of pills.

And as @itsjustme said, Sched II meds have always had to be walked into a pharmacy, so that's not knew. I don't know if you have the kind of Dr. that will write you 3 post-dated scripts or not, but you can always ask.

You sound like your doing the best things for your Chronic Pain already and that's using multiple modalities of therapies to make it fee better. I hope you continue to do well.

They just passed the new law regarding 7 days worth of pills at a time, got that from my local news. guess it could be diff. , wouldnt be the first time the news was wrong. Doc use to fax over my script till a few years back. I must have gone up to sched. higher at that point i guess. currently hydrocodone as needed. I guess im upset about all this ridiculous legislation because we are retiring. My husband and I plan to travel about to find our next home. 1st stop, AZ. I am not looking forward to new doctors. We have great ones here. Plan to fly back to see our docs till we settle on a state and buy our retirement home. But once we buy will have to use local docs. Sometimes Im afraid of how much worse my every day could be. But cant afford to retire in our own state, too epensive.

Today I will be happy.

noonetwo, you can email the reporter that did the story and ask them where it is written in your state law. Or you can do a search on the internet for new state laws governing opiates in your state.

If a dr and pharmacy have approved software, they can send Schedule II prescriptions electronically AND your state law says that it is legal, it can be done. Hydrocodone combination medications because a Schedule II Oct 6, 2014. Schedule II meds cannot be called in or refilled on the same prescription.

So, this is what you were referring to, an article from the CT Mirror....

The proposal, which the Public Health Committee voted to move forward Monday, would impose a seven-day limit on first-time opioid prescriptions to address non-chronic pain in adults, although patients could subsequently get refills. Minors would be limited to a seven-day supply without the possibility of refills with some exceptions, legislators said and any provider who prescribes them would have to discuss the risks associated with opioids with the minors parent or guardian.

The bill includes an exception for cases in which the prescribing practitioner determines that a longer supply is needed to address a patients acute medical condition, chronic pain, pain associated with cancer or for palliative care. In those cases, the prescriber would be required to indicate in the patients medical record that an alternative to the opioid drug was not appropriate.

Legislators from both parties, a physician who studies prescription drug abuse, and a mother whose son died of a drug overdose, described the measure as a way to keep people from becoming addicted to opioids, to reduce the availability of extra pills that others could use to feed their addictions, and to make it easier for doctors to find a balance between treating patients pain and avoiding drug misuse.

But this Bill is for first time narcotic users and specifically not patients who are being treated for chronic pain. This Bill is aimed at patients with Acute Pain who go to their M.D.'s office walk out with a narcotic script and keep getting refills, even though they don't need them....they get addicted to the narcotics. They're putting a 7 day limit on the narcotics for Acute Pain patients, to curb the addiction trap. This is actually a good idea. The overdose death rate in CT in 2015 was on average 1 person per day....that's a really high rate and they needed to do something to keep Docs from overprescribing narcotics to non-Chronic Pain patients.

I've been in the ER getting my IV antibiotic treatment for a MRSA flare and heard the person in the bed beside me going home with a Vicoden script for Strep Throat.....yes Strep Throat hurts, but it doesn't require narcotics. That kind of overprescribing of narcotics has to be stopped and people need to understand that some of these new laws and regulations are a good thing.

The average person who becomes an addict from a "legal" narcotic Prescription is someone who was given the med for Acute Pain or pain that really never required that strong of a pain killer. Generally Chronic Pain patients, although we do develop a tolerance to the drugs, don't cross over into addiction.

WOW, how the local tv news misrepresented that whole thing. Gotta stop paying attention to the news if im only gonna warch 30 min a day, and not read rhe paper. Or look into detail anything they say, lol. Had they explained truely what the law was, no one would be upset over it, guess that was rhe goal. Thank you all for your thoughful replies, really helped me.

Today I will be happy.

noonetwo, I have had to deal with the print and television media a number of times. They do not tell the entire story. They are after viewers and readers. It is not that the stories are inaccurrate, it is the way that they choose to tell it. For example, it is not false that prescriptions are limited to a seven day supply, because in some situations they are. They just didn't include what they requirements are for a sever day prescription. The viewer and/or readers assumed information that was not in the story.

I'm sure that a lot of people here think that I am being agrumentative in my replies to some members when they say they heard something or were told something that is not accurrate. But, I am so tired of people getting all worked up over things that are just not accurrate. You have to do your own research and not depend on others for accurrate info. If someone hears or is told that something is law, they need to look it up themselves and read the actual law before they get all worked up. Even if your dr tells you something, it is a good idea to look it up to verify it. Not everyone has the same interpretation of the laws and some recent changes or new laws can be easliy misunderstood.

Many yrs ago I went for my monthly drs appt. I was taking an immedicate release pain med at the time. I could hear my dr telling other patients that he could not give them refills on this particulr pain med because of a recent change in state law, my dr told me the same thing when he saw me. I told him that I had followed the recent legislative session closely and that I was politically active. I also told him that I knew that no laws were changed that woud make it illegal for him to give refills on this particular med. I was polite and respectful and told him that if he chose to not give me any refills that I was ok with that. He told me that I was the only patient that he had that knew the law had not changed. He wrote my prescription with the same number of refills that I usually got. Based on conversations that I overheard and what was told me directly by other patients, I was the only patient that received refills that day on this particular med.

I have some more bad news about pain management. I read a research report from 2015 it stated that people in hospice care, and endstage treatment are not, read NOT, afforded efficient pain management and that they suffer all the way to the end! This research was then repeaded same year only later, Dec. I believe, and it was found, that the findings are worse than the innitial report. That due to the abuse of pain medication by some who don't need it but get it and either they abuse them or sell them to addicts, those with legitimate need, as those at the end of their lives, are not getting adequate medication for pain relief.
This information so thoroughly upset me because I have just been released from the "care" of a terrible doctor who however did work with me on managing my constant pain, and I am now with a new doctor who has not had enough time to get to know and trust me and she has changed my medication to something only marginally stronger than Tylenol. This has now put me totally back in bed unable to take care of myself. I am terrified of what will happen as I move closer to the whole body system shutdown (Autonomic Neuropathy with Fibromyalgia and other complications from spinal injuries) all that comes with it as my life ends. 72 yrs old, never in my wildest dreams have I imagined my life as it is now, I had big plans on living actively to over 100, hmm, nice dream.

and honestly since my background is in Healthcare, until the Chronic Pain and diseases that cause it made it impossible to do that job, I stay up to date on Journals and Periodicals that most people don't have access to, unless they are in the business. My S.O. and his Brother are both also Dr.'s, so we just talk about the laws and such and what's changing.

...and I'm just one of those freaky people that loves to do research. So anytime someone wants to know something and research is not their strong point, they can ask and I'll do it for them.

But the one thing I never do is take a newscaster or reporter's word as truth, you just won't get the whole story in 3 or 4 minutes, and it's their job to make it juicy and cause people to stir about it.