Pubdate: Fri, 14 Mar 2008 Source: DrugSense Weekly (DSW) Website: http://www.drugsense.org LETTER OF THE WEEK WARY OF MONITORING By Linda Paey That was a wonderful article about the dilemma of pain medication, however I am strongly against prescription drug monitoring. My husband is Richard Paey. He is a chronic pain patient who had a high need for strong pain relievers due to a car accident, a botched spinal operation and his MS. He was well-documented in having gone to numerous pain clinics and had not doctor-shopped. Yet he was still targeted by the police. They stubbornly dragged him through three trials, he spent 31/2 years in prison and then was miraculously pardoned in September. Although it was illegal at the time, the police pulled Rich's prescriptions from pharmacies and decided he was taking "too much" pain medicine; that was the sole basis of their actions against my husband. Therefore, I don't trust the police to act appropriately with information obtained from the pharmacies. I do not believe our case is isolated. In most cases, the pain patient accepts a plea agreement so no one ever hears about it. I wish prescription monitoring would be the silver bullet that could solve some of these problems. Unfortunately it will solve some and create others. Linda Paey, Hudson Pubdate: Sun, 2 Mar 2008 Source: St. Petersburg Times (FL) Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v08/n241/a01.html - --- MAP posted-by: Richard Lake