Ameritox Urine Drug Test has destroyed my doctor/patient relationship... literally.

a reply to: new_here

Well, I'm trying to be strong, for all of us. But I'm not much of an activist, I'm afraid to say. Kind of a wimp in that arena.

The very kind Ameritox toxicologist (who was shocked at the letter I got and offered to call my the doctor to explain the results(..?) had asked me to call her back today. She said she has not been able to get ahold of the doctor. (And to be clear, I am not trying to get back in with that practice, I only want the records amended to reflect reality, so that a new doc-- if I am finally able to secure one-- will not have a warped view of who I am.)

This whole situation has me in emotional distress. I hate dealing with it. I called to see if my records had been received at the new place yet, and got the answering machine in the records dept. I fear they will call me back and say "No, because we haven't requested them and don't intend to."

I do so hope I am wrong, and everyone is just busy.

If it makes you feel at all better, Mondays are usually insane in healthcare practices...board meetings, etc. Not that I'm making excuses, but they could very well be swamped. I still think it would be a good idea for you to at least get a legal consultation, just in case. You're doing the right thing and you don't have to be outspoken to fight back. In fact, quiet and calm is probably the best way to handle this because they already know they're walking a thin line with what they're doing. If they think they got away with it, they'll be bolder about doing it again, and that is where they will get caught.

originally posted by: new_here

originally posted by: tigertatzen
a reply to: new_here

I'd say you are the one who lucked out, ultimately.

I agree with NavyDoc. And, like I said before...you could be an unwitting instrument of change for the better. You're raising awareness, opening eyes. And you're not going to be caught in the crossfire if the DEA decides to unleash on that doctor, because you're taking your business elsewhere.

Well, I'm trying to be strong, for all of us. But I'm not much of an activist, I'm afraid to say. Kind of a wimp in that arena.

The very kind Ameritox toxicologist (who was shocked at the letter I got and offered to call my the doctor to explain the results(..?) had asked me to call her back today. She said she has not been able to get ahold of the doctor. (And to be clear, I am not trying to get back in with that practice, I only want the records amended to reflect reality, so that a new doc-- if I am finally able to secure one-- will not have a warped view of who I am.)

This whole situation has me in emotional distress. I hate dealing with it. I called to see if my records had been received at the new place yet, and got the answering machine in the records dept. I fear they will call me back and say "No, because we haven't requested them and don't intend to."

I do so hope I am wrong, and everyone is just busy.

The priority is to get a new PCM. If you get out of that practice and establish with a new practice before they get disciplined again (and they will), then what they say will be taken with a grain of salt by future practitioners.

a reply to: new_here

S&F for alerting us to this turn in our medical care. What they've done to you is outrageous. Is this part of Obamacare?

I feel terrible for you. No one should be put through this.

I hope you have access to free legal advice.

originally posted by: AuranVector
a reply to: new_here

S&F for alerting us to this turn in our medical care. What they've done to you is outrageous. Is this part of Obamacare?

I feel terrible for you. No one should be put through this.

I hope you have access to free legal advice.

Thank you, AuranVector. Personally, I do not think it is Obamacare, per se. In my opinion, it boils down to "big business" (Ameritox) scamming ignorant or lazy doctors with huge claims about the ability of their service to show something it is not capable of showing, and my (former) doctor not doing her homework. I say this because of these points from a court ruling in 2012:

• Four of Ameritox’s advertisements constituted false advertising.
• Urine drug testing “cannot determine the timing or quantity of the drug taken by the patent” and any claim that it can do so “would be literally false.”
• Ameritox admitted that some patients it labeled as using medication improperly may in fact have been compliant with their regimens.
• Going forward, Ameritox will not state that its services “can tell whether patients are taking their pain medications consistent with the prescribed dosage.”

Source

originally posted by: new_here
Thank you, AuranVector. Personally, I do not think it is Obamacare, per se. In my opinion, it boils down to "big business" (Ameritox) scamming ignorant or lazy doctors with huge claims about the ability of their service to show something it is not capable of showing, and my (former) doctor not doing her homework. I say this because of these points from a court ruling in 2012:

If the quality of FBI forensics is anything to go by a lot of these labs just make up the results because they get too many to accurately process them all. A few years ago there was a big push against these companies because their testing isn't accurate. Let me give an example, lets say a test is 99% accurate. That means 1% of people who take their medications won't have them show up. 1% may sound like a small number but we're talking millions of people being tested per year. If 20 million people are being tested, then 200,000 people are erroneously being kicked off of their medications every year and being given fraudulent medical histories, then you have the issue of compounding the error every single year as a new batch of people fail their tests.

Lets say this goes on for 20 years (we're about 10 years into it now), and after 20 years you'll have 18.3% of people who have failed tests due to lab error meaning nearly 1 in 5 are being prevented from the medical consultations and treatment they need. That's for just a 1% error rate. In practice the best of these tests are only 95% accurate (5x the failure rate example above) and the bad labs of which there are many are even higher.

Get yourself a lawyer, they are well aware of these failure rates and frequently use them in their defense arguments. The average error rate on a urine test btw is 15%, that means there's just over a 1 in 6 chance of a false positive (or false negative in this case).

Here's an article on the subject that you may want to read
blogs.scientificamerican.com...

a reply to: new_here

They did that to me also and gave me a big bill.

My doctor said why are you not taking your meds, I said because you don't prescribe those to me, Da!

a reply to: Aazadan

Thank you for the article... more evidence. I appreciate it!

originally posted by: new_here

originally posted by: AuranVector
a reply to: new_here

S&F for alerting us to this turn in our medical care. What they've done to you is outrageous. Is this part of Obamacare?

I feel terrible for you. No one should be put through this.

I hope you have access to free legal advice.

Thank you, AuranVector. Personally, I do not think it is Obamacare, per se. In my opinion, it boils down to "big business" (Ameritox) scamming ignorant or lazy doctors with huge claims about the ability of their service to show something it is not capable of showing, and my (former) doctor not doing her homework. I say this because of these points from a court ruling in 2012:

• Four of Ameritox’s advertisements constituted false advertising.
• Urine drug testing “cannot determine the timing or quantity of the drug taken by the patent” and any claim that it can do so “would be literally false.”
• Ameritox admitted that some patients it labeled as using medication improperly may in fact have been compliant with their regimens.
• Going forward, Ameritox will not state that its services “can tell whether patients are taking their pain medications consistent with the prescribed dosage.”

Source

What's needed is a class action suit against these scammers. They might be legal technically, but they shouldn't be. What they're doing to people is criminal.

I think the Fraud Division of the Sec of State for your state might point you in the right direction. There should be a governmental agency that you can complain to about medical fraud.

If enough victims got together you might gather enough weight to put these jerks out of business, or change the laws that make this kind of scamming legal.

This is where social media might actually serve a worthwhile purpose.

a reply to: AuranVector

Frankly I am quite surprised there is NOT a class action lawsuit. It is certainly ripe for one, and they've come about over lesser things.

bottom line is that you didn't take the dosage as prescribed that morning, it was a conscious decision that YOU made against doctor's wishes. You didn't follow instructions to the letter, and in a drug trial, this is crucial.

You know who's to blame? YOU.

originally posted by: babybunnies
bottom line is that you didn't take the dosage as prescribed that morning, it was a conscious decision that YOU made against doctor's wishes. You didn't follow instructions to the letter, and in a drug trial, this is crucial.

You know who's to blame? YOU.

Hey Doc is that you ?

The do a dip test. They can't tell the levels without further testing.

I didn't hear her say anything about a Trial. She was worried about her Blood Pressure.

So before you blame this women for not wanting to have a stroke.

Try to put yourself in her position. It's not called a "Practice" for nothing.

originally posted by: babybunnies
bottom line is that you didn't take the dosage as prescribed that morning, it was a conscious decision that YOU made against doctor's wishes. You didn't follow instructions to the letter, and in a drug trial, this is crucial.

You know who's to blame? YOU.

You perhaps missed the part where the doc, at the prior visit, approved of me altering the official dosing instructions of Adderall until my BP was under control? (My idea, expressed it verbally, she condoned it.)

Also, this was not a 'drug trial.' I've been prescribed the medication for almost 15 years.

a reply to: whyamIhere

Hey Doc is that you ?

HAHAHA!!! whyamIhere, I needed a good laugh.

originally posted by: new_here
a reply to: AuranVector

Frankly I am quite surprised there is NOT a class action lawsuit. It is certainly ripe for one, and they've come about over lesser things.

It's not the sort of thing that's easily won. Every person involved needs to prove they were an erroneous test result, then you have to prove that error is above the stated error they advertise on their tests, and then you need to prove it's the policy of the testing lab to cut you off. These things can be eliminated but not mitigated by using several different samples and passing or failing them over a period of time. For example, the average false negative on urine is 13% going by the article I linked you. If they're testing 2,000,000 people that's 260,000 false negatives. If they do a battery of 3 tests and you need to pass two to conclusively state you're using your medications properly that's 29,406 who were that will fail.

Lets say those tests are annual with that 1.4% error rate, over 10 years that's 13.2% of people effected or 264,000. Over 20 it's 24.6% or 492,000.

Basically what all of this comes down to is that these tests aren't reliable enough for doctors to make major medical decisions regarding your care with. There are actually some big pushes going around saying that urine tests are too inaccurate to be legally admissible because they don't eliminate reasonable doubt. If a court won't accept them, then why should your doctor?

But this all goes back to the testing company. Depending on their claims and what they say their responsibilities are, it could be entirely on your doctor to determine if you're being dropped as a patient. In that case the testing company assuming they were honest with their testing reliability is off the hook.

originally posted by: Krazysh0t
a reply to: Lgbtlivesmatter

a reply to: OpenMindedRealist

This has little to nothing to do with Obamacare or Obama being the President and everything to do with the FDA trying to clamp down on the rampant prescription pill epidemic that has swept the country in the last decade. Also, this drug testing thing has been going on longer than Obamacare has been in effect.

It has everything to do with Obamacare and Obama being the president. Certainly you don't think the FDA is a rogue organization that isn't compliant with Obamacare and doesn't report to the federal government in any capacity?

Liberals can't see the forest for the trees. This is why Hillary will be our next president. Get used to your mandated urine tests and little to no actual healthcare coverage. Remember it was all of you that voted for him that brought this down on yourselves.

originally posted by: peskyhumans

originally posted by: Krazysh0t
a reply to: Lgbtlivesmatter

a reply to: OpenMindedRealist

This has little to nothing to do with Obamacare or Obama being the President and everything to do with the FDA trying to clamp down on the rampant prescription pill epidemic that has swept the country in the last decade. Also, this drug testing thing has been going on longer than Obamacare has been in effect.

It has everything to do with Obamacare and Obama being the president. Certainly you don't think the FDA is a rogue organization that isn't compliant with Obamacare and doesn't report to the federal government in any capacity?

Did you miss the point where I said that this program predates Obamacare? By the way, Obama doesn't micromanage everything each federal agency does... He just gives an overall idea of what needs to be done or approves an already existing plan then the agency runs pretty autonomously. Obama is probably aware of the program and approves of it, but he likely didn't think of it or decide to implement it.

Liberals can't see the forest for the trees. This is why Hillary will be our next president.

I'm not a liberal... So your insult really falls flat against me. I'm not going to vote for Hillary either.

Sorry guy I don't remember ever having to fill a cup for prescription meds like the OP had to when Bush was in office. The fact is the changes have been implemented under Obamacare, however much you may try to deny it.

a reply to: peskyhumans

I'm guessing you'd prefer to just keep your eyes closed and blame Obama, but in case anyone wants to learn something, I'll go ahead and leave this here.

stopthedrugwar.org...

In recent years, doctors and hospitals have turned increasingly to pain contracts as a means of negotiating the clashing imperatives of pain treatment and law enforcement. Such contracts typically include provisions requiring patients to promise to take the drugs only as directed, not seek early refills or replacements for lost or stolen drugs, not to use illegal drugs, and to agree to drug testing. And as the contract linked to above puts it, "I understand that this provider may stop prescribing the medications listed if... my behavior is inconsistent with the responsibilities outlined above, which may also result in being prevented from receiving further care from this clinic."

Sounds pretty much exactly like what the op is going through. This article is dated 2006 - who was in office then, again?

ETA: Wanted to add how it says "in recent years" which means this had been going on since before 2006.

the system is so funny.

they have killer fake/synthetic urine with balanced ph, urea, uric acid, and creatine.

i dont understand how all these mandates can come down about pre employment drug screens when all one has to do is go get some of that stuff.
people are passing like crazy cause of that stuff.

if you get a cheapo test with no uric acid you'll fail the panel. get the good stuff with the uric acid and youre good to go.

it just makes no sense to me.
if they want drug screens to be effective across the board then those products prob should not be able to be purchased.
if they are able to be purchased then maybe the drug screens should be done away with because it clearly does not work.

i just dont get it.
either stop with the tests or pull the products......
its ridiculous

Wow. After reading even more responses, one thing has become blatantly clear: The War on Drugs needs to end, and the DEA needs to go. Law enforcement has zero business making medical decisions or policy. This is just another way for Big Brother to further intrude on the private business of the citizens. Patient privacy is completely gone.

These are some of the reasons that I avoid submitting myself to the medical industry. Now I will be certain to never submit to any urine test for drugs given by a doctor. If they refuse to do anything for me, so be it. Hell, with what I've seen of medical quackery these days, I'd be doing myself a big favor. But the DEA scheduling of drugs really needs to end. If any classifications should be done, it should be done by medical professionals, not federal police. Actual science, ya know, combined with ethics and reason.