What Only Your Doctor and Pharmacist Understand

That's because the instructions are written in Latin.

Not! But thanks. Latin it is not, Bull it is!

Not in the UK, they have to be printed now.

Most of the terms are abbreviated.

They used to use latin but now must use plain english. qds four times daily, tds three times daily. You could see (tabs (name of tabs) take qds or as required.) It was to save time and to standadise the language also so you would be kept in the dark.

Yes, I got that ,; But don't you think it is opening a huge liability suit?

There are millions of people endangered by wrongly interpreted prescriptions. Many places now force doctors to use a computer to author prescriptions that also transmits it to a data base to track other abuses. I like the idea

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22prescription+errors%22+%2Bdeaths&btnG=Google+Search

The docs computer records will be able to record everything about your health. Do you trust the system to keep your confidentiality ? Anybody in power or with money can know you , literally , inside out.

Oh to heck with it! Let us just put it binary and bar code it. Hell if you can take the time to write that putz you could draw a few lines, No? Maybe thats the new language?

Many pharmacies call the prescribing doctor to verify before filling the prescription for this very reason.

There is a short film on public safety and medicines on "youtube" that shows an all digital approach where the doctor emails the prescription directly to the chosen pharmacy. The patient goes in and gives a paper slip to the pharmacist and the medicine is ready and waiting so it can be handed over. Good until some one works out how to hack the system.

Thanx 4 ur comment. I do enjoy this forum. Besides, this was just a day in my life. Perhaps you will have more comment on my nexy Q? Look-out for Ashman!

Ya they all have to. and most times it is printed on the letterhead. But why can't they just print the damb' thing? It's not like they don't get 60$ an hour for my 2 min on the little waiting room. Heck, if I charged my 250/hour they should pay me!

My first ever paying job was in dispensing pharmacy some thirty five years ago. Then it was all by hand, we even made our own medicines and doctors could have things made to their own formulation. Modern methods were just creeping in, in the years I worked there nearly all the old methods got retired. It is sad to see it now were all that happens is a person reads the script and just sticks a label on a box or tube. Now you are just a dispensary number.

I'm a MD, what the heck do you mean?

I think the main reason they write it in code is because they are required to do so. By doing this they prevent prescription fraud. If they wrote it in plain english then people could steal a prescription pad and write their own prescriptions. They also have to check a quantity box as well as write the number in word form now to prevent people from putting another number in front of it.

I have to admit, I am guilty of that last one. I had a tooth pulled once and the dentist wrote me 4 pills to kill the pain from a pulled wisdom tooth. He checked the box 1 to 20 so I just put a 1 in front of it and got 14, lol. I mean you should get something out of the deal, they get a bigger pay raise all the time and we get the $20 copay plus your 20% and thats if you have insurance. Hoorah!

Useful info http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_prescription including a list of common abbreviations. Note that many abbreviations are discouraged-such as qd (use q day or daily) and qid (write out four times a day). bid and tid (2 and 3 times a day) are still OK. The physician should explain to you what the medicine is, how to take it and what it should do for you, as well as common or rare but serious side effects and what to do about them. I speak as a practicing Hospital (not retail)Pharmacist who has been enjoying CR4 daily for perhaps 6 months-this is my first post. Grapald,RPh

In the UK most prescription items come with a patient information leaflet. This lists the conditions treated and any known side effects. You can then go back and complain about the serious problems you are having and try to get a better deal.

There are a number of texts that give abbreviations and terms used in prescriptions. If your doctor hasn't changed yet, they will soon. Now the prescriptions are sent electronically to the pharmacy, and the medication(s) and instructions are printed by computer before faxing, etc to the pharmacy. That way, all the doctor has to do is indicate the medications(s) and usage rate, the computer has all the data stored and prints out the details, re take before meals, don't take with milk, etc. Go to a good library and look at the doctors desk reference books, Merck Manual, et al.

You are not supposed to know what it means. You are only the stupid patient , and it is not your place to question the Doctors evaluation . Speaking to the Doctor or describing your symtoms is an impertinent intrusion upon his demi-god status. The Doctors Hypocratic oath should surely tell you that his opinion in all matters phsical spiritual and otherwise are beyond question.His ethics and morals may not even be discussed by lesser beings. He has anointed himself with the courtesy title Doctor to demonstrate that your Phd in Pharmacology or whatever is barely an equal. The illegible handwriting is not an accident.

Praise Ra / Do what you're told.

Sorry medicos , but some docs do live in an ivory tower.

If anyone has the type of Doctor Kris is describing, waste no time and find yourself a new one. And report the egotist/jerk to the Medical Practice Board in your juristiction.

My post was a summary of some of the doctors I have encountered . My current doctor is fine , but there are still too many pompous ones out there. The structure of the health service here is that they don't seem to live in a market-force reality . That helps neither doctor or patient. Having a National Health Service is great , but politics is killing it. It's health is worse than mine . The NHS is probably in terminal decline , which will be a big loss to a noble principle.

For a very funny doctors perspective , see if you can find a copy of "Dr Cooperfield"'s column in the Saturday Times.

What the HELL are you talking about? Most of the doctors I have ever met fall into that catagory. Not to mention they are the biggest slobs around home, and nurses aren't any better. OK they wash their hands once in a while, they are still slobs that think their s**t don't stink.

Sorry medicos , but some docs do live in an ivory tower.

Yeah, you are right.... just as some researchers, polititians, tennis players, public clerks, car mechanics, housewives.. (where does this list end?)

just as some researchers, polititians, tennis players, public clerks, car mechanics, housewives.. (where does this list end?)

I totally agree , but docs are under question in this thread. Getting engineers to lampoon themselves on cr4 (or any other engineering site ) would be like getting the British Medical Coucil to censure one of their members. I take that back , the former does happen .

Once, I stood nose-to-nose with a doctor and actually said, "I seriously question your medical ethics!"

No need to go into the details why it came to this, however, I can tell you that if she had been packing, she would have shot me on the spot. All she could do though, was turn dark red and run out of the room. I never saw her again.

My wife sustained a minor eye injury the other day, we queued in casualty for an hour before being told that not only was the required machine broken, there was no optometrist available. I stood in casualty and phoned our opticians, told them it was urgent, got an appointment for 30 min's away, got to the opticians, sat next to a guy who had just come out who said the optician had saved his life, as when he was last in to see him he noticed a skin spot that was cancerous. His quack had told him it was a birthmark! Straight in, sorted, prescription (legible) job done. No contest. I don't want to knock the national health, but going private can save you money, as well as stress.

Like your avatar, this is an old horror story. It has been recorded many a time that a GP looked at a small black spot and tried to pop it like a black-head with disastrous results!!!

Sucks, doesn't it.

I've been thinking, (something occasionally do these days) and have realised what it is that get me exorcised. it isn't an honest mistake, we all make those, it's the arrogance to believe we are incapable of making a mistake, to the extent that we are not capable of listening to another view point. The only incident I have experienced with the medical profession was the day I fractured my finger. The break was spiral, in my palm. and was admittedly hard to detect by examining visually or by touch. The Doctor concerned refused to believe the bone was broken, on the grounds that I could move my fingers. He insisted the pain would be too great to do this, despite my assurances that there was pain, and the fact that I could feel the edges grate together. The guy was not at all abashed when he saw the X-ray, refusing even to apologise for doubting my word, although a passing consultant did! What it comes down to is attitude, fail the 'A' test and loose respect.

It's a little known fact that doctor's have been in gang for years, and the "scripts" gang slang for persecutions are written in tag language.

If you could see you doctor's underwear, it's either blue or red.

You are so right. These gangs keep attacking me with harsh critisism like stop smoking,drinking and having any kind of tasty food. Then they write this down so when I go back and see another member of the gang, he can also have a go.

Over here in Scotland they use computers now to write out prescriptions. Everyone knows this is so they can play solitaire when you think they are actually writing out the prescription. The prescriptions are just randomly chosen long names and the pharmisist has just two types of pills. Antibiotics and a very large suppository which has no medical benifit other than to take your mind off your illness for a few minutes.

I think the patients should be directed to this forum. They would not need the doctor or the prescription. The humor would cure them.

It made me crack up.

It used to be latin, but I guess Doctors haven't been required to take latin for quite soem time now. Abbreviations cut down on fraud as well as speed pharmacy operations. If a doctor makes a mistake on a prescription and the paharmacist dispenses it, in the U.S. the pharmacist is subject to as much liability as the doctor, maybe more. That's why pharmacy school is almost as long as med school. If your doctor is a jackass, get another one.

There is only one good way to take revenge on the Doctor-Pharmacist mafia:-

Die unmedicated

Heck, you're an American! We're some of the most litigious people in the world. Don't you know that by merely mentioning this subject that you too are now liable.

You know I've heard it said that the reason Oriental countries are ahead in technology is because their ratio of Engineers to Lawyers is 10:1. America, on the other hand is just the opposite - one Engineer for every 10 evil Lawyers.

What do you call a bus full of lawyers heading off a cliff with one empty seat?

A crying shame?... OK - I give up.

Bingo!!!

OK - You've probably heard this one.

You are standing with a group of engineers talking. How do you tell the extrovert among them?

No, I've never heard that one before! How do you tell the extrovert?

He's the one looking at YOUR shoes!

Once upon a time, I needed antibiotics and the doc gave me the "as usual" illegible prescription. Since pharmacists usually get things right, I totally trusted the medicine they gave me.

I needed to take a capsule 3 x a day which I dutifully followed. A day later, I was feeling a little strange. My head seemed like it was under pressure so I went back to the doc to ask what was wrong. Her eyebrows shot up when she heard that I was taking an antibiotic of 750mg three times a day! Her prescription was supposed to be only 350mg but the pharmacist misread it.

Fortunately, the docs today print out their prescriptions or at least write legibly. They also take time to explain what they'd written. A lot safer all around.

Her prescription was supposed to be only 350mg but the pharmacist misread it.

That happens only when you get REDKRYPTONITECILIN prescribed!

I agree with all of you when you complain about the way of writing of most of my coleagues. Later today I will write some lines about that: my wife is sitting in the car waiting for me to go to the supermarket with her!

A quick trawl indicates that 1 in 10 doctors can not write clearly. Maybe they need a doctor ! My quick search looked at a number of sites , and the figure was common in even those run by doctors. I imagine this did not even take into account the confusing acronyms etc.

Worrying to death may now save me from this dilemma.

Look, as long as the doctor writes me a prescription on one of those 3-copy pads, I'm happy to take it!!!

Kris!!! What the heck happened to your avatar?!

I know - I 'm cute and cuddly this month. .< hee , hee , hee>

Now where'd I put that pellet gun?

That's remind me of the story about the guy who gets a letter from his brother, he just can't read it, so off he goes to his local pharmacy and asks the pharmacist to read it for him. The pharmacist put his glasses on , looks at the writing for few seconds, disappears behind the counter, comes back with three small packages and says: "Two dollars and seventy five cents please.".

Wangito.

There's an old variation on that story.

A doctor writes something on a prescription pad and sticks it to the fridge door before leaving home. The wife takes the "prescription" and takes it to the pharmacist. He tells her that it says, "I'm going to be doing surgery tonight and will not be home in time for dinner".

Yah, and there's another variation,

During a vision test, the patient is half blind but needs to pass the test, So the optometrist asks him if he See's what's in front, and the patient Say's: "What do you mean see?, I personally know him.!"

Wangito

And who said that the pharmacist himself understan's what written that prescription?

The answer is rather easy. Pharmacists, for the most part, have a client base that come back on a regular basis for prescriptions. Those patients tend to use the same doctors so over time the pharmacists learn to read the scribbles from those docs. It is similar to you and I signing our name - some people might have a difficult time reading all the letters in our signature but you and I can read our own scribble.

Another factor is that a drug can be identified by reading only part of the drug name and through consulting with the patient, can determine what drug is being prescribed. In the cases where the prescription may be from a new doctor and none of the standard ways of determining what the drug is that is being prescribed, the pharmacist will call the docotr's office for clarification.

As for using computers to prescribe drugs, those methods are limited by the accuracy of the database to which they are linkled to. It is wrong to assume those databases are kept up-to-date on a regular basis because governments simply do not work that efficient. However pharmacists through their regulatory bodies received up-to-date info immediately as it becomes available through faxes and e-mail alerts so they are more comfortable relying on their professionalk knowledege as opposed to relying on some database that might ot might not be up-to-date.

I think the computer/printer is just to create the text of the scrip, which is chosen by the Doctor and the system can be made to detect errors in dose, wrong patient etc.

The scrip can even be sent to a central data base to the patient gets a unique machine readable identifier and when he gets to the Pharmacist, they access the same data base for confirmation and repeates etc.

It would take all of them to be online to a data base, but they are already...VISA/MC etc, so it is very doable and I am sure it has been done in places. In 10 years this will rollout in most civilzied countries.

These system pay for themselves in the first year by eliminating fraud and doctor shopping druggies who go to 30 doctors with a pain in their foot/back etc and get a painkiller scrip. This gets eliminated as in some places ~5% of scrips are frauds, maybe more??

At least the computer model has helped in one instance... If you get your prescriptions filled at the same pharmacy, the computer will check automatically whether there are any interactions between the drugs you are taking, and flag it to the pharmacist.

Do you have computer database that work ? Our NHS ones have been created by/for the goverment. Need I say more.

It is not as simple as you describe and it isn't simply a script that is used. First of all there are privacy issues that nmeed to be addressed. Hence there needs to be legislation in place that would allow professionals be they doctors or phramacists to share the info.

If a script is used to ensure that the wrong dosage is not used, it can onbly do so by checking with a database.

When a doctor sends a prescription, he or she will include whether there are repeats and hence the phrmacy will have in their records the number of repeats that are available.

Currently for narcotics, there is a three-page prescription pad that doctors use and copies of the prescriptions they send this way are submitted to various bodies to ensure the process is not abused.

You equate a VISA database as being equivalent to one holding medical records not so.

While eventually an online records system will likely be put into place, there are a number of hurdles that have to be overcome - the utmost of which is patient confidentiality.

In Canada not many doctors are online with VISA etc as the Canada Health Act prevents them from charging a payment. While many labs that oofer services not covered under Medicare do accept charge cards, doctors' offices do not.

Well, I was of the opinion that non- OHIP covered services can be paid by debit or credit card. OHIP services carry no fee at all.

I agree, a medical data base does not need to be as secure as a VISA data base. VISA has everyone + dog trying to crack into it. Medical records have privacy issues and thus need partitioned access for doctors and pharmacies. That means the MD accesses/updates his records and does his OHIP invoicing and can place a scrip into a pharmacist accessable file. When the pharmacist inspects the printed scrip he can then access that record for verification. He will then have the repeats etc and then maintains his own protected database that only he has access to. To avoid duplication, he can flag that scrip as being filled by him so the MD will know if the patient whines he has lost his scrip and tried for another.

I do not know how much of this theoretical system I describe has been implemented, but it is very much worth while doing. I am amazed it has not been done years ago.

I wonder why such a fuss is made about patient confidentiality? Who cares about anyone else's records. I certainly do not care about them, and any doctor who treats me or insurance company that insures me should have access.

For lab services you are correct, only those services are not offered through a Doctor's office. Services offered through a Doctor's office are covered by Provincial medicare. That doesn't mean some doctors in clinics might try to charge extra such as providing a medical opinion for an insurance claim. Most doctors offices don't do that.

For those clinics that charge companies for employee check-ups etc - they bill the companies directly as that service (initiated by the employer) is deemed to be outside of the Canada Health Act.

You misinterpreted my comment. I believe that a database containing any individual's health records MUST BE MORE SECURE than a Visa database.

Apharmacist needs to understand a person's medical history before they fill aprescription. You would be surprised at the mistakes doctors often make by prescribing a drug that could interact with another drug a patient is taking or that a patient has an alergy with.

You comment that " He will then have the repeats etc and then maintains his own protected database that only he has access to." is counterproductive to the reason for having a central database which is to allow other pharmacists to be able to view the drug histroy of a patient who walks into the store with a prescription to be filled.

I do believe that having a central database for all practioners in the health system to use, however before this can be achieved all professionals must buy in (which is far from happening right now), and who absorbs the cost of designing and implementing such a system? (In Alberta, where I live, the government has been working on such a system for at least five years now and are no nearer to implementing it than they were at the start.)

Well, you can set your partitions where you like. There can be an MD only area, a Pharmacist only area and a shared area where both have access, and where pertinent data for both can be stored as well as possible feedback.

Currently the VISA/MC/AMEX data bases are very secure. As far as I know there has not been a theft of data from them. Many vendor data bases have been stripped of date and these are what you have read of. Most of the VISA data bases have caller ID on their lines and the vendor sends an encrypted data stream (Joe spent $20.00 at my shop #xyzxyz) and he gets back a yes/no and an approval code. They normally send out no data. Mail order companies must also input the delivery address and the transaction will only be approved if it is shipped to the correct address (which they will not tell you....you must supply the correct ship to address) VISA and the rest are very secure organizations and the medical fraternity would do well to copy them. No-one will bother to crack the medical data base...no money to be made.

That said they also need a zero connection between the MD and Pharmacist to avoid anyone issuing fake scrips. The central data base has to be the secure man in the middle.

You are missing the boat on the entire reason for relying on electronic health databases. The Pharmacist MUST know what the patient is being treated for and the doctor MUST know what drugs the patient is receiving. Kepp in mind that a patient could be seeing several healthcare practioners for different reasons (doctor, eye doc, dentist) all of whom can prescribe drugs for different ailments. Without full access, an electonic database as you describe would be nearly meaningless and certainly not worth the money needed to develop it.

There have been thefts from VISA and MASTERCARD databases - does the store name Winners ring a bell at all?

Citibank was also penetrated by a hacker from Russia a number of years ago.

The last thing I would want is for the medical community to copy VISA etc.

There is a lot of money to be made - can you imagine if a person was to access the health info of say a politician and discovered from his prescription records what he or she is being treated for - if it was std's it could lead to blackmail or forcing someone out of office (John Brown for instance?)

Your comment about zero connection between a pharmacist and a doctor is counter to what you are trying to stop - fake prescriptions or multiple prescriptions. Those cannot be detected UNLESS a pharmacist interacts with a doctor. Forinstance, if a patient has stolen a prescription pad (which happens quite often) and detects a difference in the hand writing than what they might be used to from the same doctor, then the only way to confirm the prescription is through a phone call. Similarly if the pharmacist catches an error with the prescription, a phone call is necesary to clarify the issue.

The Pharmacist MUST know what the patient is being treated for and the doctor MUST know what drugs the patient is receiving.

Obviously a single patient, who may be playing games with 3 doctors and going to three pharmacies, wants privacy, or he/she is undone. So unless a person wants to tell a doctor he is from the USA on visit and wishes to pay fee for service, he will have to submit to the commonality of data amongst professionals and trust to their integrity to keep his data private. This will stamp out a lot of abuse.

As for Winners. They were a client data base, and not a credit provider data base. The providers are a lot more secure.

One loss by citibank was a physical loss, and so far none of the purloined data has surfaced and or been used.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/06/06/national/main700001.shtml

another one was worse...

http://www.livinginternet.com/i/ia_hackers_levin.htm

Similarly certain ailments need privacy. Gout does not need as high a level of privacy as an STD. It is probably best to have a high degree of security for all.

I am confused because in your last post you inferred that the doctor an dpahramcist partician of the database would not be accessible by the other party. Now you are afirming that both parties need to know what the other is doing with the patient.

Generally speaking travellers here have insurance and doctors offices along with most pharmacies direct-bill. That is to say the patient doesn't need cash or credit to pay even if he or she is from outside the country. If they are from outside the country and need emergency treatment, they get it without having to pay.

The case I was referring to was Vladimir Levin which you pointed out. However as you will see from the following link, the hacks are not customer databases but are the databases used by companies employed by banks to carry out the transactions.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/2774477.stm

http://archives.cnn.com/2000/TECH/computing/12/13/credit.cards.com.hacked/index.html

I stated that a data base would need a physician's section, and pharmacist's section and a shared section. Implicit in that was the doctor would place data the pharmacist needed to share and vice versa into that shared section. Now what if we have three pharmacists and three doctors. Each with their own private data base. They would need to make a shared patient data base they could all access, correct?

Yes, I see what you mean. When VISA offloads processing to third parties, they can be a weak link. It matters not that the client is protected against losses in $$, there are other losses, prestige among peers etc that need to be looked after.

These horror shows of data losses seem to be getting fewer? or the crooks steal and then ask for $10 million and are quietly paid and we never know.

Yes, most doctors scribble instead of doing what the rest of humans call writing.

Despite my hand writing has always been very clear, as years went by it turned a bit harder to read; but is still legible.

Due to the type of job we have, we usually are obliged to write while standing in front of the bed of a patient, or in a chaotic ward, at 3 AM, leaning against a wall whilst patient from Box 1 (sore throat) is complaining about the delay in being examined, the crying daughter from the lady in Box 5 does not understand why her mother (95) who jumped from a 15^th floor passed away… and a helicopter is landing on the roof carrying 2 heavy injured in an highway accident. This has to be done while avoiding being hit by a trolley transporting a patient to X-rays and noticing that a half eaten sandwich placed into the pocket one hour ago in a rush started dripping ketchup on the shoes. The damn sandwich was your first meal in the day… and the cafeteria has been closed long ago. Do this for 10 or 15 years 2 times a week and you will probably be scribbling as well!

On the other hand, Latin was the scientific language (today worldwide replaced by English) first scientists used to write in. Saxon countries kept a lot of terms and abbreviations as a tradition, while most Latin countries don't do it for decades. (Good for us!)

In some countries (UK, USA) pharmacies buy generic drugs in large containers, which are custom placed into a plastic bottle and also custom labeled for a specific patient. In mine (as in may others) you get a recipe for XXX, which is the trade-mark of a specific drug, sold over the desk, packed and labeled by the manufacturer. Your way of doing thing relies a lot on the honesty, knowledge, responsibility and skills of the pharmacist, while the other depends more on a Quality System of a given laboratory. Second is (no need to say) far more expensive. The latter also requires a pharmacist to have a lot of brands of the same product in stock … and also (this is probably what many of you thought but did not dare to but black on white) leads to certain degree of corruption cause some MD's get benefits from the laboratories if prescribing this or that drug. I have worked in many countries and have seen this almost everywhere…

Impact Cases has posted a comment I support.

Last but not least: if there are a lot of stupid, engineers, lawyers, police officers, and so on… why can't we be stupid as well?

Yeah!!! He's right!!!

And to heck with all those kick-backs that all the doctors get from drug reps!!! I say, if everyone else can be crooked, why not doctors!!!

You tell 'em!!!

What should shock and cause all to worry is that nearly 15% of all medicines made are now fake. China and India have been found to produce large quantities of fake medicines. The WHO "world health organisation" reported their concerns to world governments earlier this year. Most of these end up in third world areas but even in America and Europe it is now a very serious concern.

A lot of the so called fake medicines are not fake at all. They are grey market. Genuine medication from a third world country, made for that country, at a price in keeping with their level of income. They may pay 5¢ for a pill we pay $1 for, but the hourly wages are in that ration and the pill costs 1/20 ¢ to make, so they still mnake profits. If those medicines are found in Canada, Squibb or Pfizer, or whoever made them is quick to call them fake etc etc, but it is just a lie. All medicines with a provenance are good. So if you set up a company in that 3rd world country and buy that pill fro Pfizer and export it to Canada, it is safe and fine. Sadly the authorities take the word of Pfizers of the world without looking deeper.

This is the same big Pharma company that buys salt from other countries at $5000/ounce, thus exporting $$ to that country. They call that transfer pricing and all the major pharma companies do it in a big way with raw materials to evade taxes.

Aurizon, you are 100% right! In my country are a lot of multinational labs (Novartis, Smith Kline & French, Bayer, etc etc) that export most of their production. Same happens in Brazil, India and China. Quality is the same... but prices only a fraction.

Nowadays it is very difficult to sell under your trade-mark a drug with a defective manufacturing, as most countries health authorities require QC, QA, FDA and CE mark to allow you to sell it.

To deny there is a black market for drugs is like trying to hide the sun with the hands. This does exist, but is usually managed by organized crime: what this guys do is to falsify the original packaging of a well known medicines and sell the for a fraction of the prize.

Pricing is based on supply and demand for a monopoly. They will charge as much as they can get away with balanced against losses to bootleg supply. Millions are invested in research for time limited rights. They are going to take as much profit as they can by any means. People in poor countries will just have to grin and bear it while they make as much profit as possible from the more affluent countries.Pharmaceutical companies are not ethically inclined.

Those I am referring to are FAKE NOT JUST CHEAP. Several illicit labs have been uncovered and the ingredients used found to contain several poisons. Even in the UK this industry was found to be thriving. The danger is real and people have died as a direct result of either the incorrect make up of the medicine or because of there being no active ingredient content and their condition killed them. It is estimated that over 10,000 have been directly killed by taking fake medicines. Many others have been harmed but recovered. It is not a situation to take lightly! How would you you feel if you were dying and it was because some low life just wanted to make a quick buck off you or the healthcare system. DO NOT ASUME IT IS ALL BECAUSE DRUG COMPANIES ARE GREEDY!

Yes, there are indeed completely fake medicines in Asia and Africa. Few to none have posions in them as inert ingredients are very cheap and the last thing a faker wants is to draw attention by people dying from their fake pills, so they would not use a poison to make them in the first place.

An ineffective fake medicine can also kill by failing it it's task of controlling blood pressure etc = strok potential

You are right!

On the other hand, where do people believe medicines sold over the internet come from?

I get 30 or 40 mails a day offering from Valium to Viagra, don´t you?

A lot comes from India, I hear and has the active ingredient.

I do not buy meds from the web due to lack of known provenance.

I suspect that the spam sellers of viagra/valium on the web are just $$ cheats. You receive nothing and they get the VISA number and address of the fools who gave it to them and it gets charged to death

I suppose in the future when wages have equalized this problem will vanish.

I am on your side Doc.

My wife and I are just getting out of the car to go into a fine restaraunt, in proper attire when her beeper sounds off... Forget the restaurant... we are off to the hospital... She attends to the patient while I spend a couple of hours in the waiting room. By that time, the restaurant is closed, so we end up going to McDonalds in formal ware.

She works weekends/nites when lots of trauma shows up. Our schedule and plans have not been disrupted since Saturday morning (05 May) when all things went to hell at the hospital... and all our plans for the day did too.

Gawd am I glad I selected Engineering rather than medicine... but I've learned to live with it (medicine that is...). For those of you who thinks Docs take Wednesdays off to play golf, well... try being married to one.

Here is one for you, you bunch of heretics!

Why don´t we just get rid of all MD´s and have them replaced y computers with artificial intelligence software?

What a very good idea. Then we might get the treatment we need and not some moody comment about our life style. Most doctors I know of would be far better if they stuck to being medical practitioners and not social commentators.

My Wife was a nurse. According to her;

The doctors are actually taught to write this way. As reply 14 said, it is code to prevent fraud, and someone from writing thier own prescription.

prn for example means take it as needed.

Here is a list of doctor's shorthand.