Author: jonathanm1978

Posted: Thu Jan 26, 2012 9:45 pm

This one leaves me on the fence…I’m not torn to be either for nor against giving out doc information.

Just a few reasons, and this differs from family (like my mom, sister, or someone who knows me calling my doc and saying I’m doing something like selling med or taking other opiates)

1) The internet is mostly anonymous. So WHAT if you give someone your doctors name?? Are they going to call up said doctor and say "zippitydoodah on somewebsite.com said this, and this, and this and did this and told me this", and suddenly your doctor has a hissy fit at your next appointment? I think not. ANY doctor with ANY sort of class or moral would be WELL into knowing that people on the internet are as misconstrued as some of his patients who aren’t trustworthy..so he SHOULD take anything that involves internet forums with a grain of salt. (Notice I said INTERNET FORUMS…NOT thesis and study-related material that can possibly change the way a doctor diagnoses or does treatment)…

2) For the most part, all of us here are currently already being treated with suboxone. Even the person who sent the PM said they are already in treatment. That gives a feeling of respect and maturity that someone has taken the steps to get to this point in their recovery and is just look for other means.

3) Maybe some of us haven’t been so lucky as to be blessed with a stupid quack as a doctor but in my past, I HAVE. So I now what it’s like to be stuck in a doctor’s care that you can’t get out of, and to be prescribed pills that you don’t even want – or even waste the money getting filled when they are written each month. I dealt with that for a year of my recovery, ALL BECAUSE the doctor made me fill out a 2-minute questionnaire, and my answers on that questionnaire told him that I was bipolar. He then put me on antipsychotic meds, Seroquel, which made me throw up every day for 3 days straight. I would climb out of bed with my head POUNDING worse than any hangover headache…and walk to the front door and step outside to throw up…the third day, I said TO HELL with seroquel..that quack doesn’t have a clue..and I quit. This was after COUNTLESS calls to him telling him about these headaches..and his response? "Take 1/2 a dose tonight instead. It may have been to much, but 1/2 a dose will probably make you feel fine..and it takes a few days to get ‘used’ to the seroquel."
Few days my ass, I couldn’t stand to even hold my head up for those 3 days..and he wanted me to continue it until…….
So with docs like that around, I can understand and be compassionate enough to give the information to someone if they so want.

4) My own NEIGHBOR went to my doctor…and he got caught with suboxone in his system that he wasn’t even prescribed. I didn’t give it to him, but i knew where he got it (from another person that I convinced to pursue ORT with Suboxone, and she did). Did my doctor cross-reference my neighbors address and my own? They are EXACTLY the same, except for his number is 5450 and my number is 5508. Same everything else as far as road name…so they would KNOW that anyone who lived less than 300 feet from someone who’s been tested positive for suboxone would be the most likely suspect for giving the meds out..but was I questioned on it, or even hinted to about it? NO. Most of us in the country know about how addresses are gotten…so we know how they got 5508 for my route number. That means that I live 5.508 miles from the start of the road. And my neighbor, who’s at 5450, he lives 5.450 miles from the start of the road. And the closer you get to the end, the lower the number gets. That’s how paramedics and such can tell where someone lives..by how far down the number is — mostly that only works in rural areas though, not in cities or suburbs.

There’s really just not enough stuff that I’ve seen happen with drug addicts and the internet to warrant me being so scared that I wouldn’t give out my doc info via online if I were asked. Most people who are actively seeking addicts are a little too busy spending money on pills and the chase to pay their internet bills..and they don’t have a computer that will even get online anyway..
When I was actively in addiction, yes I had a computer, but I didn’t care about sitting still to try and stir trouble too much. I was too busy cleaning bathrooms with a toothbrush and soldering satellites with phone jtags…and supporting 17 people with free dishnetwork..which meant i CONSTANTLY worked on a satellite receiver all hours of the day and night…the backstabbing that you see IRL for the most part stays IRL and doesn’t carry-over to the internet, because addicts don’t have a real avenue to stir trouble online.

We’ve seen SOME people here who like to belittle or stir trouble, but that’s on ANY forum. And I can tell someone my doctors name in Birmingham, Alabama, and nobody here can do enough research to find out my name..Even if a moderator was to give out my IP address…you still can only point to me having an IP address that originates from Birmingham, Alabama…and I live over an hour from that city. So the closest to my doctor that anyone can put me is within the same city…and Birmingham is the 2nd largest city in Alabama..I doubt seriously that anyone can do enough detective work to get much further, nor would anyone really have the reason to do so.

Saying all of the above just to say this: The internet is not a medium for doctors to moderate their own patients.

Even if Dr. Junig had someone join this site and claim to be one of his patients, unless they gave out specific information on themselves, he couldn’t really say much about what they discuss or say here on this site, and use it against them in the privacy of the doctors office. He could ask questions…and could even send PMs to the user and try to find out who they are..but anyone could watch the clinic door, walk in and look at the sign-in chart..walk back out, then come and create an account here and say they are that person. Can the doctor rightly hold anything that user says against that particular patient? No…it’s the internet. It would be a heck of a situation..but if Joe Smo saw me sign into my doctor in bham, knew my doctor had an internet forum, and looked at my name on the sign-in chart..then he goes home that evening and creates an account and claims to be me on the site….and goes around talking about selling suboxone, and snorting / doing opiates…can my doctor do anything to me for that? Legally..that would be a big opening for my doctor…because this is the internet, and anyone can say they are someone and be lying. So it would have to take a big bunch of evidence to prove the doctor has a fake account-holder.

I know it’s internet jargon to be protective and careful with personal information…I’ve been on the internet since early 2001..and when I started using it, we only had mIRC to chat with….but with things like telling someone the name of a doctor, there’s not really much that you open yourself up to. There might be certain ways to properly ask for that information…but to keep it a closely guarded secret like it’s KGB sensitive information, I can’t really say is called for.

To each his own though (or her own, whatever the case might be).