Posted by med_empowered on December 6, 2006, at 15:35:55
In reply to Re: Legal/Medical Advice, Please! 2 both posts :) » madeline, posted by liliths on December 6, 2006, at 15:11:32
wow. Your situation sucks. I really admire your courage, though--a lot of people would have just given in. Its tough, I'm sure, but I think its admirable that you're fighting this Big Brother-style bulls**t.
Anyway...getting the doc you're seeing to do much will probably take a lot of work, and he might not do much.
What I think might work is contacting someone who's been doing research in this field. If you google it, I imagine you could find someone. Also, for buprenorphine, there's a searchable, online listing of docs who are licensed to RX it. I searched it, and found that a lot of them were shrinks, which probably means the buprenorphine is being used off-label a good bit. Maybe you or your lawyer could call or write some of these people and explain the situation. If you could get other doctors--doctors who haven't evaluated or prescribed for you, but who are experienced with dealing with opiates off-label--to back-up your med combo and your current doc, I think that might help tremendously.
Also: I'm a little confused as to how this other doc thinks he can compel you to choose different meds. In the US at least, the whole "off-label" deal means that any doctor can decide to give any drug for any purpose as long as there is some sort of indication that it could work well for *that patient*. It sounds like your doc is RX-ing responsibly--no massive doses, no crazy dosage escalation, etc.--so I don't see why this other doc's opinion should carry any sort of weight. Your doctor is providing you with legal access to medications that have proven helpful, and what he is doing is consistent with the practices of some other doctors. Its not as if he's hooking you up to an IV of Dilaudid every time you come in for an office visit.
The buprenorphine list is www.turntohelp.com
Dr.Ivan Goldberg has a website for mood-disordered people
http://www.psycom.net/depression.central.html
On it, you will find a link to email Dr.Goldberg and contact list for psychiatrists who deal w/ treatment-resistant mood disorders. My guess is that some of the doctors on the list, and possibly Dr.Goldberg, RX opiates for certain cases; since these people are recognized experts in their field, input from them could possibly prove helpful.
I wish you the best of luck--please keep us updated, and you can babblemail me if you'd like.
poster:med_empowered
thread:710822
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20061206/msgs/710926.html