The need to know about medications has “snowballed”. Experts say many people are anxious to know about their medications and they often receive half a dozen calls a day from people checking to see if two prescribed drugs can be taken at the same time. The pharmacist is called more often than the doctor, because the pharmacist is more easily accessible. People also check with pharmacists when they purchase over-the-counter drugs to see if they are okay to take with a prescription.
There is concern with Senior Citizens and medications. One of the problems is as people age, their metabolism changes and the medications are not burned up as fast as with a more active person. In older people, the drugs are detoxified in the liver and eliminated in the kidney.
Over the years, the drugs build up over a period of time. Another problem with Senior Citizens, they are concerned about the cost and often do not take their medication or take only part of if. Or, they simply forget to take their medication.
Health care professionals say that Home Health Aides are a tremendous help to Senior Citizens as far as taking medication. There are also containers that have a pocket for each day which helps people remember what medications they have to take and when.
It is a tremendous advantage, Hughes says, to have one’ doctor and one pharmacist. They will keep records of what medications are prescribed. Pharmacists are required to keep much better records than they were years ago. Also, they must take a complete inventory of their drugs every two years. In this way it would be easier to check if a pharmacist was suspected of trafficking ‘drugs illegally.
Forged prescriptions happen, but not frequently. If there is a question locally, the pharmacist calls the doctor to double check. “A strange psychological effect develops in people who have drug problems,” say health practitioners. “They think they are unique with the stories they come up with, but they are really quite the same. They invariably give themselves away in some way or another.”
Nationally, an estimated 10 percent of prescriptions are never filled. This, also, happens rarely. Most prescriptions are called from the doctor’s office to the pharmacist. Then, if a prescription has been filled and not picked up it is known immediately.
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Make sure you understand what the label on a prescription is saying. There are five schedules of drugs, starting out - with drugs posing the highest potential for abuse. The quantity of a drug in a compound often determines where the drug is placed in a schedule.
Schedule I — High potential for abuse with no accepted medical use in the United States or lacks safety for use; used in treatment under medical supervision: Opium, mescaline, peyofe, psilocybin (angel dust),heroine, hashish and marijuana (which contain THC, tefrahydrocanabenol), among others.
A controlled substance is anything that is subject to abuse, even though It is intended for physical use.
The most commonly prescribed drug today is a non-narcotic drug used for ulcers and stomach conditions which are caused by the “modern life”.
A second commonly prescribed drug is Valium and similar types of medication. Valium is a tranquilizer prescribed to relieve symptoms of anxiety, tension, fatigue or agitation. Major adverse reactions include confusion, depression, lethargy, disorientation, headache, lack ‘of activity, stupor, etc. It is a central nervous system depressant and must not be mixed with alcohol and a variety of other drugs.
Schedule II — High potential for abuse; accepted medical use in treatment with severe restrictions; abuse may lead to severe psychological or physical dependence: Methadone, amphetamines, methamphetamines, cocaine, among ‘ others.
Schedule HI — Potential for abuse less than Schedule 1 and II; acceptance of medical use in the U.S.; abuse may lead to low physical dependence or high psychological dependence: Derivatives of barbituric acid and compounds containing limited quantities of codeine, morphine, benzphetarnme, among others.
Schedule IV — Low potential for abuse; abuse may lead to limited physical dependence or psychological dependence: Barbital, chloral hydrate, Phenobarbital, among others.
Schedule V — Low potential for .abuse; limited physical dependence of psychological dependence:
Compounds containing limited quantities’ of narcotics, such as terpin hydrate with codeine. Some of the names of narcotics have taken on new and different “street names”. Some of .those include: ‘Heroin is also called horse or smack; Reds are secobarbytol and seconal; Yellows or Yellow Jackets are Nembutal; Black Beauties are a bimethamphetamine Perks are Percodan;’ Bennies, Benzedrine and White Cross are street-narnes for amphetamines; Speed is a methamphetamine; Angel Dust is a street name for psilocybin.
Families protect and hide the female alcoholic and drug addict — they feel the stigma deeper with a woman than with a man. A family is more apt to talk about or complain about the male alcoholic In -their family. But, wife and mother” they’re going to hide and she will very often die hiding from various complications, of her alcoholism. Fewer women-get help than men do —.more women lose their families than men do. When they finally seek help, they’ve usually progressed further in-the illness.
Tags: alcohol, amphetamine, controlled substance, depressant, drug addict, heroin, medications, narcotic, pain killer, prescribed drugs, tranquilizer, valium
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