Will Missouri finally create a PDMP to stop doctor shopping?

Last year, Missouri’s drug overdose mortality rate was seventh highest in the nation, with 17 fatalities per 100,000 individuals. Since 1999, drug overdose fatalities have more than tripled, according to a report released by the Trust for America’s Health.

Yet Missouri is the only state that has not adopted a prescription drug monitoring program (PDMP) for controlled substances, which would provide prescription information from a database for physicians and pharmacists to access.

Maybe state Rep. Kevin Engler’s recently introduced bill will change that. At the end of January, Rep. Engler introduced House Bill No. 1133 to enact a PDMP that would require dispensers of controlled substances II, III, and IV to electronically transmit the prescription information and patient identification within seven days of dispensing.

The Department of Health and Senior Services would monitor the prescribing and dispensing of controlled substances. Pharmacists and prescribers would be protected from any liability from damages if they did not obtain information from the PDMP, according to the bill.

To the State House

“Missouri is becoming the doctor-shopping capital of the nation,” said Rep. Engler in a recent report from the NewsTribune.com.

Engler noted that the bill has been reintroduced for a fifth year. “It’s embarrassing that Missouri is the only state” that hasn’t passed legislation in favor of a PDMP,” he said.

Last year the bill was passed by the state House of Representatives, yet died in the state Senate. The Missouri Pharmacy Association backed the bill and commended Rep. Engler for explaining the reasoning behind the bill to the House.

“By implementing a prescription drug monitoring program, we will join the other 49 states to prevent controlled substances from getting onto the streets and into the wrong hands,” said Christian Tadrus, PharmD, president of the Missouri Pharmacy Association, in a release last year.