DrugBuyers.Com: New system tracks prescription drugs

http://www.kentucky.com/mld/kentucky/news/11156417.htm

New system tracks prescription drugs

DOCTORS, POLICE GET RECORDS ON DEMAND

By Jack Brammer

HERALD-LEADER FRANKFORT BUREAU

FRANKFORT - Doctors, pharmacists and law enforcement officials in Kentucky have a new weapon in their fight against prescription drug abuse.

State officials announced yesterday that Kentucky is the first state to put into operation a self-service computerized system for tracking prescriptions of pain pills and other potentially addictive drugs.

The system, known as eKASPER or Enhanced Kentucky All Schedule Prescription Electronic Reporting, is the result of a $1.75-million upgrade of a manually operated drug-tracking system Kentucky established in 1999.

In recent years, the old system, known simply as KASPER, has become overloaded by doctors, druggists and law officers requesting information in efforts to identify possible drug abusers and traffickers.

The new all--electronic version, which started up yesterday, will allow authorized users to request prescription data from their office computers around the clock and receive reports within 15 minutes. Before, requests and replies were exchanged by fax and took four hours or longer to complete.

Although more than 20 states have prescription monitoring programs, no other state yet provides a self-service, Web-based system.

"EKASPER is the most effective and efficient tool ever implemented to combat prescription drug abuse in Kentucky," Robert J. Benvenuti III, inspector general in the Cabinet for Health and Family Services.

About 1,300 pharmacies report all controlled substances they dispense. Controlled substances range from painkillers such as OxyContin to cough syrups containing Codeine.

The only people allowed to obtain reports are medical doctors, pharmacists, law enforcement officers with active investigations, licensure boards, Medicaid officials for Medicaid recipients, grand juries and judges.

Benvenuti said the online system uses a registration process to help safeguard the information. "Any system is hackable, but every measure is taken to ensure that there will be no violation," he said.

However, Beth Wilson, executive director of the Kentucky chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, expressed concern about "the standards" of people eligible to retrieve data.

"Will it really happen only in circumstances of suspicion for law enforcement? I hope it is for serious investigations only, but you have to worry about the potential for abuse," she said.

Improper use of KASPER is a felony.

In 2000, KASPER users placed 36,174 requests for information. Last year, that number hit 122,469. The system was initially designed for 1,500.

Before 1999, it took drug officers an average of 156 days to investigate a prescription drug case because pharmacy records had to be searched by hand. Under the paper-based KASPER, the time dropped to 16 days.

"With eKASPER, it's expected to drop further, plus provide improved accuracy," Benvenuti said.

Dave Sallengs, branch manager for drug enforcement in the health cabinet, said 87 percent of KASPER reports are sought by doctors checking prescription histories of patients. But less than 50 percent of doctors were using the old paper-based system, he added.

"We certainly hope that more doctors will use the information" under the new system, he said.

The quicker response time may help physicians more easily spot "doctor-shoppers," who visit several doctors in a row in hopes of collecting multiple narcotics prescriptions. In the past, such patients were usually gone by the time reports came back to doctors. Pharmacies faced similar delays when filling prescriptions.

About 6 percent of KASPER requests have come from law enforcement, Sallengs said. That surprised Kentucky State Police Commissioner Mark Miller. "This is an incredible tool for police," Miller said. "I hope to see it used even more."

But George Moore, Commonwealth's Attorney for Montgomery, Bath, Rowan and Menifee counties, said he expects doctors to use the system more than police.

"KASPER is not a fishing tool," Moore said. "Doctors really are the front line of defense against prescription drug abuse. For law enforcement to use KASPER, there has to be a certification of law to make sure it is not abused."

The new system was funded by a $1.4 million appropriation from Kentucky's 2003 General Assembly and a $350,000 federal grant secured by U.S. Rep. Hal Rogers, R-Somerset.

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