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is this legal?? what can i do???why has this happened?

I have been under the care of a pain doctor for 3 years now. In till recently i have had no trouble at all with anything. I liked the doctor and he always seemed concerned with every aspect of my treatment. Every monthly visit i am drug tested and i have never had any trouble with these tests since i have always used the med's the way the doctor wanted me to. in 3 years i had never missed an appointment or had really any trouble with anything other then the fact that i couldn't get my prescriptions filled in the town i lived. i had to travel 40 miles out of town to a pharmacy that was willing to fill the scripts for me. i was told that a few other pain clinics in the town i lived was making it hard on my doctor because of there practices. when i first started going to this pain clinic i was able to fill my prescriptions in the town i lived but about 4 months after i started seeing the doctor the pharmacy i was going to refused to fill my prescription with out really giving me a reason other then they just would not fill the prescriptions anymore. i ended up calling other pharmacy's in town and found that no pharmacy would fill the prescriptions from my doctor. i asked the doctor what was going on and he told me that an owner of 1 drug store in town was on the local medical board ,"what ever that is" and that this 1 person who was the head of the board decided that my doctor and 4 or 5 others in my town were not good doctors and got the pharmacy's in my town to stop taking the prescriptions from my doctor as well as others in town. so i ended up calling up pharmacy's till i found one that took me and i started driving 40 miles every month to get my prescriptions filled. This did bother me and i guess i should have taken this as a sign that something was wrong but it had taken me a long time to find a local doctor to treat me because of my age i think. i have hat is called  degenerative disc disease and rheumatoid arthritis and also a torn rotater cup in my shoulder from a motorcycle wreck. I am 35 and did not know that i had the arthritis till i had got into a wreck and was told by the er doctor that my neck was riddled with arthritis and looked like an 80 year old's neck. i have had back trouble since i was a teenage from being hit by a truck which i guess is what started the degenerative trouble in my lower back which has now become severe.  But it took me months to find this doctor and be taken in as a patient. When the trouble with the pharmacy's started and i ended up having to drive out of town to get my prescriptions filled it seemed like a small price to pay because of all the trouble i had actually finding a doctor who would treat me. i had asked other people who went to the same doctor if they had the same trouble and they said they did and they also had to drive out of town so that made me feel some what better knowing that it was not just me that this was happening to. I am now going to fast forward 3 years into my treatment and explain why i am now here writing this in this forum.  for 3 years i went to this doctor and had no trouble...like i explained i was drug tested each visit i had to this doctor which was monthly and that was pretty much the extent of the scrunity i had to deal with under this doctors care. he was and is a likable guy who always was very detailed and explained everything about what he was prescribing me, why he was giving it to me and how i should take it. he always checked me out and had me get blood tests every 6 months to make sure everything was ok since some of the med's he had me on could cause liver or kidney damage. He had me on 2 different narcotic pain killers as well as an anti-inflammatory drug and he also had me on a muscle relaxer as well as a benzodiazepine for sleep since i have what he called a sleep disorder. i had been on these medicines for 3 years almost to the day the trouble started. i decided to take a much needed vacation since i got a few weeks off of work that were paid and i had recently had 2 deaths in my family which combined with work had me under a lot of stress which i kept my doctor informed about since he was also a psychiatrist.  i went out of town a week after my doctors appointment and everything was fine and i got a phone call from my doctors office on my cell phone asking me to come in for what they described was a pill count and that i had 1 hour to come in to the office. i told the staff who had called me that i was not currently in the state and that i was on vacation....she told me to hold on and she went away for a few a brief time and came back on the phone and asked me when i was going to be back in town. i laid out my whole vacation plan to her and told her that i was going to be gone till around the end of the month but that i had planned to be back in time for my appointment with them.... she said ok and asked me to call there office when i got back into town, i said ok and we got off the phone. almost exactly 2 weeks after that call i was checking my voice mail on my phone and i was in an area that i had spotty service so my phone was off most of my trip but i had 2 messages from my doctors office telling me again that i needed to come in for what they called a pill count which i didnt even really know what it was since i had never had one and never heard of it. i called the doctors office as soon as i heard the messages again and this time my doctor answered the phone and i asked him what was going on and told him i was on vacation and he played it off and though nothing was wrong and he was even laughing and kidding with me on the phone and he asked me when i was going to be back and i told him i would be back in town in time for my appointment...he told me to give the office a call when i got back into town which i told him i would and we got off the phone and to make this short i finished my vacation and got back into town 2 days before my appointment on a sunday and my appointment was the following  tuesday...i called his office on monday and was placed on hold then asked what i needed and i told the staff who answered that i was calling because i was asked to call.....i left the doctor a message letting him know that i had called and saying that my appointment was the following morning at 9am and i would see him then.   the next morning i went into the office as normal and went to the front desk and the girl who was new asked me my name and i told her and she looked down and couldn't find my file...she told me to hold on and went around the corner and grabbed my file from a location on a desk and came back opened it and then told me that i had broken my narcotic contract by not coming in for a pill count as ordered and that i was no longer welcome in there office and would no longer be seen. i sit there completely confused not knowing what to say really and i asked what she was talking about and why? well she again stated that since i did not come in for this count i was no longer going to be seen by the doctor. i asked to speak with the doctor and i was the first patient there they had just unlocked the doors and i was the first in and she said he was with other patients and i could not speak with him... .i asked about my medications and what i was to do about them she said if i wanted i could have my records forwarded to another doctor but that they would no longer treat me. i asked her what this pill count was and she was really hateful and rude with me and she said that i had broken the contract by not showing up as instructed for them to count my medications which i then asked why they were even asking me to come in for that after me being there for 3 years and they never once did that and she just kept spitting out the same lines. does anyone know why this has happened and what i can do? is this legal for them to do this? how do i avoid the severe withdrawal from all the medications i was on for 3 years?
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Avatar universal
Woops... this is a million year old thread. My above post (the congrats post) was meant for Daniel (DJH79).
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Avatar universal
I would like to CONGRATULATE you on going cold turkey and getting off all the crap. BUT.... that being said, make sure that you have either friends and/or family KNOW what you are doing. Going CT (CT is the cool way of saying cold turkey) DOES put a wee bit of stress on the body (heart, etc.), so it's good to have your friends/family check up on you during the next 3 days or so.

If you're gonna hide it and be all secretive, well, you could also do something like tell a family member that you thought your "heart" is acting up, but you should be all right, maybe it's the flu and ask them to check in with you.

Ideally (I don't give advice, I always speak as if it was me and this is what i would do if i was in your shoes), let your doc know you are going cold turkey and would like them to check in with you. They may even give you something to make your CT be more comfortable, even out the instabilities.

You do realize that when you completely quit narcs, you are going to be a new man, and you will feel like the King of the World. You probably don't know that yet. Post back in a couple weeks. Inspire some other people to quit, like you, that don't really need them.

Congratulations!
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Avatar universal
Thank you for replying to my post. i have decided to just go cold turkey.....there are completely NO resources here where i live for anyone who is not a drug addict....i have a reputation to uphold and i cant be seen in a methadone clinic or a substance abuse rehab. what little work i get now would completely vanish if that were to happen. mentally i am not dependent on these narcotics but my body is and i did some research on withdrawal and found some info that should help me not suffer as much as i would be suffering. i think the hardest thing that i will be facing in the next couple of weeks will be the lack of sleep and the high blood pressure which anyone who has taken a narcotic pain killer and then came off of it with out help knows that you can feel it in your hands and feet and really your whole body. i am hoping  that the small amount of med's i have left will help me ease the withdrawal some what by taking small amounts and spreading out what i have and make it last as long as possible. the only thing i really need that i don't have is my anti-inflammatory med Mobic which is already starting to effect me since i am completely out of them...i am starting to get stiff and getting out of bed in the morning is starting to get really hard with out it. i do have a full bottle of Naproxen i think i can start taking in place of my Mobic...i was taken off of it because it was starting to give me really bad stomach cramps but at this point i think i can take a little stomach cramps since i will be having them anyway because of the withdrawal from the 2 narcotic pain med's i was taking. Any advice anyone on here can give me that would help me with what i am trying to do would be greatly appreciated and again thank you for replying  "marycarmel" !!


Daniel
Helpful - 0
1855076 tn?1337115303
There was definitely some red flags with your doctor, though I think most of us go into pain management somewhat naively.  Unfortunately doctors can dismiss patients for pretty much any reason they want ... or for no reason at all.

How many pills do you have left?  I would start tapering which, while it won't eliminate withdrawals, they should be milder.  Also start looking for a new doçtor.  Call hospitals, many have pain management clinics in the hospital.  Ask your primary care if they can write your scripts until you can find a new pain doctor.

Write a letter with your version of what happened.  Also write and request a copy of your records and check to see what's written is accurate!  If it's not, write a letter disputing it.

Lastly, check out the Substance Abuse forum.  They can give you all sorts of tips on supplements that ease withdrawal symptoms.  Good luck and keep us posted on how things are going.
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