DATABASE WOULD KEEP ABUSERS FROM SHOPPING FOR PRESCRIPTIONS

CINCINNATI - An Ohio bill designed to prevent "doctor shopping" by creating
a database to track drug abusers who get prescriptions from multiple
physicians has moved to the Senate.

The database would be modeled after a system in Kentucky, which takes about
20 minutes to review a customer's history. Police say Kentucky residents
are going to out-of-state pharmacies or doctors because of the system.

Pharmacists were alarmed at the dramatic increase in prescription drug
abuse making its way from Kentucky into Ohio and requested assistance in
creating a program for Ohio, said Rep. Tom Raga, the bill's sponsor.

The bill would track the misuse of dangerous prescription drugs through law
enforcement, pharmacies and health professionals, said Raga, a Republican
from Mason.

The House passed the bill 71-24 last week.

Only people filling prescriptions that are typically abused, such as
OxyContin, would be entered into the database, said Bill Winsley, the
executive director of the Ohio Pharmacy Board.

Some lawmakers balked at the bill's cost, estimated from about $600,000 to
more than $1 million. Pharmacy licensing fees would help pay some of the
cost, but an undetermined amount would have to come from the state's
strapped general spending fund.

Access to the database would be strictly controlled and the information
would be destroyed two years after a drug's sale unless a criminal
prosecution was under way, Raga said.

With the database, doctors would be able to differentiate between
"legitimate" patients and those trying to take advantage of the system,
Winsley said.

"Right now doctors have to use a judgment call and a lot are
uncomfortable," Winsley said.

Prescription medicine now ranks second, behind marijuana, among drugs most
abused by adults and young people, according to a report released in March
by the White House's Office of National Drug Control Policy. It cited a
recent study by the Health and Human Services Department.

Twenty states have prescription monitoring programs, the report said.

John Walters, director of the National Drug Control Policy, said he expects
to expand the program to 11 more states by next year. About $10 million in
federal funds will bankroll the expansion.

Raga said Ohio uses an outdated system to track potential drug abusers.

Under Ohio's current system, investigators have to fax a form to different
pharmacies throughout the state requesting an individual's prescription
history. The process can take up to a month.