National Safety Month; The Danger of a Prescription

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The National Safety Council, in an effort to create awareness and reduce the leading causes of injury and death, has established June as National Safety Month. When one thinks of safety, perhaps the following comes to mind: wearing a seatbelt, keeping a close watch on little ones, or having emergency numbers on hand at all times. However, many fail to remember the importance of safety for prescribed medications—specifically prescriptions of controlled substances.

In 2012 alone, 259 million prescriptions were written for opioids, which is more than enough to give every American adult their own bottle of pills. In comparison to ten, even five years ago, this number is dramatically increasing as time goes on and more and more opioid overdoses are being reported on a daily basis. Prince? Elvis? Sigmund Freud? Bueller…? While their stories may have been reported nationwide, people from all over the country and from all different backgrounds are unfortunately experiencing this crisis right in their backyard.

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The dental industry is often victimized as the gate keeper of such prescriptions, but luckily there are efforts in place to monitor how, when, and to whom these controlled substances are prescribed. That is, so long as the dental community, both prescribers and Dental Support Organizations (DSOs), are ready to step up and take action. Fortunately, electronic prescribing (e-Prescribing) has the power to assist in alleviating the opioid epidemic that is upon us, but how exactly?

• e-Prescribing diminishes the possibilities of duplicate or lost prescriptions since the prescription is sent directly to the patient’s pharmacy
• A patient will no longer have a paper prescription where the dispense quantity can be altered
• Prescribers will have access to a patient’s medication history, therefore they can determine if a patient is “doctor shopping” or has a history of substance abuse

Be an innovator and stay ahead of the curve, all while enhancing patient safety and quality of care. A patient’s wellbeing and the ever increasing amount of lost lives depends on it.

Sources: World Health Organization (WHO); American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM)

About DoseSpot

DoseSpot is a Surescripts certified e-Prescribing platform specifically designed to integrate with electronic dental record, practice management and telehealth software. DoseSpot is certified to e-Prescribe controlled substances and has provided simple, affordable and integratable e-Prescribing solutions since 2009. For more information, please visit http://www.DoseSpot.com.