This has become a matter of huge concern in Florida as the drugs that one can avail in this manner are being used to sell it to other people at a higher price illegally. The drugs that one get according to Doctor Shopping is also being used by the person as addiction. The drugs that the people want are usually Oxycotin or Oxycodone and Hydrocodone. These are the narcotic pain relievers. They are only used in case of severe pain.

Patients or other people usually visit a doctor complaining about severe pain in the back or any other body part for that matter and try to avail the drug in the form of a prescription. They do this with many other doctors in Florida and get a legal way of attaining a huge amount of the drug. They then either sell it or use it for themselves as an addiction.

This has led to a major problem in Florida as the number of deaths due to drug addiction has been increasing and one of the main reasons is the overdose of the prescribed drug and this is hugely influenced by Doctor Shopping. This has led to a problem as innocent and sincere citizens who try to get a second opinion from other doctors. The people who are not satisfied with their first doctors try the opinion of the second doctor in order to get better results. These innocent people also have been the suspects in the case of Doctor Shopping.

Thus Doctor Shopping has been the case of abuse of drugs and the improper use of drugs. This has led the Florida Senate to look into the matter of Doctor shopping very carefully. The narcotics department and the drugs monitoring agency in Florida are working together to crack down on the Drug Mills set up due to doctor shopping. A bill has been passed by the Florida Government that would enable them to monitor and check on the prescriptions and the drugs handed down by the clinics to the patients. The clinics have the duty to report to the Department of Health the details of the person and the drugs along with the quantity that is handed out to the patients.

It has been found that 85% of the oxycotin drug is being prescribed on Florida in USA. This is reason of massive drawback for the state, when the state is all set to reduce the problem of the drug and alcohol in such a stage oxycotin a strong drug is still being used in the market of Florida as a prescribed drug. This is a matter of concern for the concerned authority of government’s health department. The amount of intake has been said to be prescribed by doctors but there are physicians who misuses the drugs.

Oxycotin is an OPM synthesized compound which is being derived from the Tsebin. The Oxycotin is being a carbon compound is initially hazardous to health. The oxycotin compound contains a hydroxyl group in its 14^th carbon. It is a prescribed drug by once consumed would be severely addiction for the patients. This drug is mainly prescribed during the time of pregnancy or for curing the asthma disease. The use of this prescribed drug is so strong that it sometimes affects the health of the new born fetus once used for the pregnant women.

The drug is never advised to be consumed with alcohol. If a person consumed oxycotin with alcohol it would create sever damage to the brain or immediate death of that person. In the market oxycotin is available in the forms of pills. This pills are generally available at dollar 500 but as this prescribed drug has been made less available in the market many doctors misuse and sale their samples in dollar 5000 to his patients. Many doctors in Florida never even advise the proper intake of oxycotin. This prescribed drug has to be changed into any other substitute.

Keeping all these information in mind, if you are one the patient who has to take these addictive drugs, you must be ware. These medicines can make you addicted to them. They are habit forming drugs and can get the better of you. The thumb rule to follow is to never share the addictive medicines with anyone who has a history of drug abuse behind him. If share the medicines, you might end up restarting the addiction in that person. You might end up supplying the drugs to that person. The next thing that you must remember is to take the correct and measured amount of drugs that is prescribed to you.  Not a single day should you exceed the dose. You must let few close people know that you are taking these drugs so that they can keep a watchful eye on the dose and duration of the drugs. This will help you keep a tab on your doses. This will also help you keep a check on yourself so that you stride away from the problem of drug abuse.

This drug has been in news recently for the cases of its abuse. The ONDCP or the Office of National Drug Control Policy has made a study on the cases of oxycontin drug abuse. The statistics of the study shows that around 1.6 million people in America alone used the prescribed drug for non-medical reasons. That is a really big number! The study reveals further that the emergency cases of oxycontin abuse have been rising with 36% annually. The number was 3,369 in January 1999 and it shot up to a whooping number 5,261 in January 2000!

There is hardly anything that one can say in this regard. The figures speak for themselves. These cases have been very frequent in the recent years. The growing numbers of rehab centers in Florida are the biggest specimens of the fact that the cases of drug abuse are plaguing Florida and the problem are growing day by day. There is hardly any thing that one can do in this case. Prevention can only be at personal level, there is nothing that government can do at such a personal level. If the people are not willing to help themselves, the government can do nothing to help them. There is only one thing that the law can do and that is stopping the availability of the drug but again if the prescriptions are available, no one can save the day.

These figures leave us with a question in our minds: what should be done about this problem?

In the year 2002, a drug database proposal was given by the legislators. According to this proposal, whenever a patient goes to the doctor, his prescription will be updated in the database. In this way, police and detectives can keep a track of the people who take to doctor shopping. This would be the most effect weapon against the drug abusers. In this way, the police will have more evidence and the people who carry out the practice of doctor shopping and drug abuse will be easily arrested. This is the one and only way to fight against the evil practice.

Why didn’t it work? The proposal was reject on the grounds that the idea of keeping track of the prescriptions invades with the privacy of the people who take drugs. If the database happens to come across a hacker, the medical history of any patient can be known easily. This practice will invade the privacy of medical profile of patients. This is the only reason for the rejection of the proposal which could have saved many lives.

Doctor shopping is the practice of going from one doctor to another to get the prescriptions so that the addicts can get the drugs that they require authentically. They amass pain pills and other illicit drugs either for personal use or for sale. This practice has become very common in Florida and the case is becoming more serious each day. This practice is taking lives of numerous people and there seems to be very less that any one can do about it. The state officials have decided to launch an awareness campaign that will make the people aware of the hazards of drug abuse and the problems that they might face legally if they are caught in the case of drug abuse. To put a stop to “doctor shopping” South Florida and state officials have made it known that they will be launching a computer database to keep a track of how many times a prescription is being used. Any prescription with medicine names like lethal narcotic pills and also anti-depressants will be kept on record and their uses will be kept in track. This will help the multiple use of one prescription to get lethal drugs.

With growing number of pain management clinics popping up in Florida, it is a cause of concern for us. Many people can restrict their use of prescribed pain killers till the prescribed time, however some people get so used to the effects of the pain killer drugs that they fall prey to the OxyContin addiction. There are behavioral and physical symptoms which show that a person is OxyContin addict.

The pain management clinics in Florida have started sprouting up all of a sudden. Use of OxyContin decreases the brain’s ability to receive pain messages from various organs in the body and the drug fires up the pleasurable feeling. However if this drug is taken excessively, your ability to concentrate decreases giving you depressed feelings with abnormal food cravings and you might feel hopeless in all the activities you do.

Doctor shopping that is going from doctor to doctor faking certain pain to get pain killers for either selling purpose or abuse has increased in Florida. It is a cause of concern as the side effects of the pain killer drugs like OxyContin are more severe if taken excessively without expert supervision. In September 2006, a 73 year old man was arrested with more than hundred OxyContin and other pain killer pills which he said to have collected from various doctors faking pain.

In the month of March 2010, a housewife from Florida was arrested for doctor shopping pain killers. Such incidents are increasing and the use of pain killers to satiate the drug addiction is going to show its real teeth in near future. We need to take steps towards decreasing doctor shopping in Florida and other states by maintaining some system and database that can prevent the illegal use of drugs.

With the help of Doctor Shopping Bill in Florida, government also is taking steps towards prevention of abuse of prescription drugs.  The pharmacists are now by law responsible to provide this information to the State Government. Now it is possible to track the person who took the prescription drugs containing OxyContin and other pain killers.

Let us take some steps to stop the drug abuse for healthy future.

Addiction to these kinds of drugs leads to harmful results in the future. When the victim will grow old, he or she will suffer from respiratory depression. This very respiratory depression results in a painful death of a victim. This is the reason why so many people die each year in Florida. Florida has been very badly affected by this grave problem. Among all the American States, Florida is believed to be the most drug consuming state. Pain killers are easily accessible and are widely available. Doctor shopping is widely practiced in Florida. Most of the drug addicts in Florida attend doctors and physicians faking an illness, so that they can easily obtain drugs from the drug store by showing the prescription that was issued by the doctors and physicians.

Some of the drug stores do not think about the harmful consequences. They only think about their sales. Therefore to keep a check on the irresponsible doctors and drug store owners, the government of Florida introduced a law. The law has empowered the authorities to maintain a database of every prescription issued, and also of the drug stores. This more will definitely help the anti-drug agencies of Florida to curb out the use of pain killers as drugs. Along with the Pain Management Clinics in Florida is working toward the betterment of the citizen of the state. They are teaching the victims how to get rid from chronic pain through controlled use of right medicine. They believe in minimum use of pain killers. There are also many drug rehab centers in Florida who are helping the drug addicts to live a healthy and better life. Florida is set to be a better place for living without the influence of drugs.

The anti drug agencies in Florida has been finding it difficult to deal with the doctor shopping menace. Doctor shopping is a term given to an act of the drug addicts who attend the doctors and physicians faking an illness. This helps them to issue a prescription from the doctors, which includes drugs such as Oxycodone and Oxycontin. They are basically narcotic painkillers which also serves the purpose of drugs. In terms of addiction they are just similar to heroin and cocaine. If a person gets addicted to it, he or she can suffer from respiratory depression in the future. Hence recently a bill was introduced, which will help the officials to keep a check on the prescription issued by doctors and physicians. The bill will allow the anti drug agencies to maintain a database of the prescriptions, and the drug purchased from the various drug stores and manufacturers in the state.

The rise in the cases of drug abuse in Florida has resulted in the rapid expansion of the pain management clinics in the state. The prime aim of the pain management clinics is to help the drug addicts to cope up with the physical pain with the controlled and right usage of medications. They teach them to deal with the trauma associated with chronic pain, and how to deal with the same. The pain management clinics have helped the victims to enhance their lifestyle through a better living, and have made the people of Florida aware with the harmful consequences of drug addiction.