Local law enforcement officers and pharmacists hope to crack down on prescription drug abusers with the help of a computer database recently implemented by the State Board of Pharmacy to track the sale of all controlled substances.
More than 2,000 pharmacies in Ohio are now required to submit prescription data twice a month to the Ohio Automated Rx Reporting System, and they must submit the data to remain board-certified, said Bill Winsley, executive director of the State Board of Pharmacy. The data can be viewed by doctors, law enforcement agents and authorized pharmacists. Having the data centrally available will help prevent prescription drug abuse, which occurs more often than abuse of heroin, cocaine and LSD, Winsley said.
Under the new system, pharmacists at a pharmacy's corporate headquarters can now access patients' records of other pharmacy visits ' which they could not do before the creation of the database ' and notify a customer's doctor if the patient is seeing other doctors for the same prescription.
Employees of corporate pharmacies' local stores do not monitor the database, but non-corporate local pharmacies do, said Mark Shaw, a pharmacist at CVS Pharmacy on Court Street.
We aren't watching the records
he said. The Court Street CVS submits prescription information to its corporate headquarters, Shaw said.
Local law enforcement officers will use the database as soon as they are familiar with it, but no timeline has been developed yet, said Lt. Darrell Cogar of the Athens County Sheriff's Department. Police officers, including a task force to be created by the sheriff, will analyze the database's specific use to Athens, Cogar said.
The database will help police officers decide whether people are legitimately reporting stolen prescriptions, he said. Athens law enforcement officers handle calls from patients about stolen pharmaceuticals nearly every day, Cogar said.
Non-corporation pharmacists will send prescription information directly to the database via computer transmission, said Hudson Health Center pharmacist Daniel Hudson.
The new system will help local pharmacists monitor prescription patterns for signs of abuse, he said. The database eliminates phone calls used to check with doctors about patient prescription history.
Critics have said the database is like Big Brother but it will not affect legitimate patients who need medication, Hudson said. With the new system, Ohio joins 37 other states that have implemented databases to help tackle prescription drug abuse, Hudson said.
Ohio pharmacies are not charged for the new system, Winsley said, adding that federal grants totaling $530,000 covered the database's implementation costs.
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Dianne Selden
New system might help authorities track drug use
