America's Most Popular Prescription Drugs

Rebecca's Side:

I don't think it's a secret that I don't trust the pharmaceutical companies or immediately accept a doctors prescription as the best medicine. As I've aged I've discovered that these drugs are not always for my best interest and have experienced first hand the effects of narcotics on a family, while the physician continued to prescribe, with no accountability. I am often surprised to find much of the general public do not question or investigate drugs released for the market and pushed, especially for our children -(i.e. H1N1 vaccine w/mercury, pushed very hard to the public with fear advertising tactics & much of the vaccine given here in WA proved to be impotent anyway so mercury was injected into children in the chaos of the public "crisis" to "protect" ourselves). Don't get me started.

If you spend even an hour or so researching addiction, you will find we are living in a period of time where addiction is rampant and prescription pain medication deaths have superseded motor vehicle deaths. If you should see tin foil on the floor of a teenagers car, it could be the remnants of the new way to smoke Oxycontin. Look for Sharpie appearing black lines across the tin foil. They suck the coating off the drugs & then heat the drug up with a match under the tin foil and inhale the fumes with a straw. As the pill pushes across the tin foil, it creates a thick black "snail trail". This is only one of the new drug uses the street drug market have developed for us and our children. Vicodin, Oxycontin, Percocet.. etc all have a great street value. Meth - creates a feeling of orgasm in the stomach. The study of the effects of sexual contact on a brain shows that it creates a pattern between the neurotransmitters in the brain. The brain feeds off those connections. Craves more. Meth produces this feeling, which is why it's highly addictive. Combined with being incredibly cheap to produce, it's become a new drug of choice. Marijuana - 20 years ago, 10 years ago, it used to take an entire joint to get high. Today's Marijuana, 2 puffs and the user has the desired effect. It's not the 60's our parents parents worried about. It's not just the cars & planes & life that has sped up. The drug industry - legal & illegal - is trying to keep up as well, with faster ways to hook us and our children at younger ages. And, yes, at times, drugs are given to the public with a little bit of testing and the consequences are not realized for a decade afterwards. This is common sense people. And we are sheep for the herding.

Doctors receive these medications from companies that are driven by sales. Not by our health, but by their billion dollar industry. Since this is an area of interest for us, I have made an effort to educate myself to protect our children and ourselves. I recently took McKenna to urgent care for a migraine. We were hearded in & out like a cattle drive. The doctor readily handed us a prescription for Tylenol with Codeine. Now many of you are going to think so what? but this is a 14 year old girl who, the last thing she needs, is the introduction of an opiate drug. Later her pediatrician commended me for my decision and gave me a plan to treat her migraines with non addictive meds. This should be the first step for anyone, especially for a child. Especially for a teenager who's brain is in the most important part of developing! Drugs wreak havoc with the developing adolescent brain, of which if it is stunted, there is not a recovery of the lost development.

I am not saying pain medications don't have their uses. They do and I've used them after having a C-Section, oral surgery. I am saying that they are highly addictive. An alcoholic doesn't become an alcoholic with the first drink. It takes time, repeated exposure that creates a need physically, mentally for the substance. Unfortunately, I think we can all realize the age alot of substance abuse starts. Adolescence. The hook sets in early on during that formative part of development. And it is highly effective. Some of these drugs like Meth & Heroine are addictive from the first use (Meth has surpassed Heroine use due to it's availability, ease to make & affordability). One try and the user, the KID, is hooked. One doesn't think about the tens of thousands of dollars rehab can cost. Or the actual % of people that actually rehabilitate. The last statistic I heard was 5%. Staggeringly low. Creates a feeling of hopelessness, should one become addicted or have a loved one hooked.

This is not a game we are playing with ourselves or our kids. Yet media and the industries profiting off of our use would have us believe it's no big deal. So I encourage you to arm yourselves with knowledge & protect yourself, protect the next generation from being manipulated to addiction. From allowing someone else or some substance to control their developing minds. (this includes the internet, media, entertainment, all things that effect our brain connectivity, but that's another blog...).

So here's MSN's article today on the top 5 prescribed drugs today. # 1 - Vicodin.

A narcotic painkiller tops Forbes' list of the most prescribed medicines.
By Matthew Herper, Forbes

The most popular medicine in the U.S. was prescribed 128 million times last year, even as a panel of experts called together by the Food and Drug Administration recommended that regulators ban it.

The drug is Vicodin, a 40-year-old addictive medicine that combines the narcotic hydrocodone with acetaminophen, the active ingredient in Tylenol; the prescription tally also includes numerous generic versions. It is emblematic of the trend that emerges from our look at the most popular prescription pills: the death of the blockbuster drug.

Forbes' list of the 15 most popular drugs comes from IMS Health, a company that tracks sales at the pharmacy level for drug companies. The list shows how medicine makers are rapidly losing their grip on the average consumer. Only one drug in the top 15, Pfizer's Lipitor, is a big-selling brand-name medication. The rest are cheap generic versions of one-time big sellers that have lost their patent protection and become commodities. Generic copies of Vicodin go for 30 cents a pill, compared to $4 per pill for Lipitor.

Vicodin is a drug that is crying out to be replaced. Vicodin has a supporting role on the television show House, M.D. because the protagonist, a Sherlock Holmes-like doctor, is hooked on it. It is particularly dangerous because when patients develop a tolerance for the narcotic they start taking too much. This can lead to liver failure from overdoses of the acetaminophen component of the combo. Most of the 400 deaths due to acetaminophen poisoning each year result from misuse of the Vicodin or similar drugs. Last June an FDA advisory panel recommended banning Vicodin. The FDA is still deciding whether to take this advice.

"People are taking this as if they're taking a strong Tylenol," says Michel Dubois, director of pain medicine at New York University Langone Medical Center. There's nothing wrong with Vicodin after a surgery or tooth extraction, he says, but it's being used too often by primary care physicians with "minimal training" in dealing with chronic pain. "It has been trivialized, and it's wrong to trivialize this strong a pain medication," he says.


The failure to replace Vicodin is not for lack of trying. Pfizer once hoped its painkiller Bextra could be an alternative. But in 2005 Bextra, a chemical cousin of Merck's Vioxx pill, was pulled from the market because it increased the risk of heart attacks and allergic skin reactions. Pfizer paid a $1.2 billion criminal fine last year for marketing Bextra for unapproved uses like dental pain. Other efforts to replace Vicodin have come up short. Vicodin-maker Abbott Laboratories worked for years on a delayed release formulation but has not been able to get it through the FDA.

The second most popular drug in the U.S. is generic Zocor, or simvastatin. The cholesterol-lowering drug was once Merck's biggest seller, but Merck lost its patent protection in 2006. Doctors prescribed it 83 million times last year. One reason: It is proven to save lives, and it costs only $1 a pill, far less than Lipitor.

Zocor used to play second fiddle to Lipitor but became more popular after it went generic and health insurers pushed it as a cheaper option. Merck, Pfizer and others tried to develop new types of cholesterol drugs with little success; the cholesterol drug market is now dominated by generics.

Lipitor still wracks up $7.5 billion in annual sales, more than any other drug but only ranks seventh by popularity, with 51.1 million prescriptions last year, down from 75 million in 2005. The second-biggest seller by dollar sales is the heartburn drug Nexium from AstraZeneca. But it is a lackluster No. 19 in popularity. Overall, only eight of the 50 most popular drugs are still branded, compared to 20 in 2003, IMS says; 75 percent of all prescriptions are for generic drugs.

The third most popular drug, with 81.3 million prescriptions, is the blood-pressure-lowering medicine lisinopril, which used to be sold under the brand names Zestril and Prinivil. Overall, six of the top 15 most prescribed meds are blood-pressure-lowering drugs. There are so many good generic blood pressure drugs that it is difficult for brand-name drugmakers to improve upon them.

The No. 5 drug, azithromycin, is the generic version of Pfizer's popular antibiotic Zithromax. It tallied 53 million prescriptions last year. Like Vicodin, it's a much maligned medicine whose popularity was once blamed on overmarketing. It's not being advertised to doctors or consumers anymore, but it's still overused.

Brand name drug companies are inventing fewer drugs—a third as many were approved in 2009 as in 1999—and the ones they are inventing aren't selling. The last good year for new medicines was in 2006. Drugs launched that year generated $1.2 billion in first-year sales, says IMS. In none of the years since have drugmakers come close to this figure.

Companies are responding by trying to focus on medicines they can sell to small numbers of people at a higher price for rarer diseases like cancer, multiple sclerosis and ultra-rare genetic diseases. Ironically, that may include the next big painkiller: an injected protein drug that blocks nerve growth. It is being developed by Pfizer and could hit the market in a couple years.

The Top 5:

Hydrocodone/acetaminophen (painkiller)
Simvastatin (high cholesterol)
Lisinopril (high blood pressure)
Levothyroxine (thyroid disorders)
Azithromycin (antibiotic)

Superwoman syndrome fuels pill-pop culture

The irresponsibility of physicians and the pharmaceutical industry makes my brain explode in anger. Be aware - physicians do not pay attention and the drug industries are making billions of dollars off of our addictions. Vicodin (hydrocodone) is highly addictive and well prescribed. Matt & I have first hand knowledge of the rendering of lives that happens from this. It was interesting when we went in for Matt's leg injury the drug the doctor wanted to prescribe for pain was Percocet. Even more addictive. Being knowledgeable, he refused and stuck with the Ibuprofin - thank you very much. (Rebecca)

Popping a couple of pain pills helped Laurie J. Besden study night after night. They helped her pass the Pennsylvania bar exam. They helped her get more done in a day than many of her colleagues. Then they helped her land in jail.

Besden doesn’t seem like any drug addict you’d picture. She's smart, motivated — and an overachiever. But she’s one of an alarming number of women who have turned to prescription pills to get ahead — or even just to keep up.

Almost 6 percent of American women, that's 7.5 million adult women, report using prescription medicines for a boost of energy, a dose of calm or other non-medical reasons, according to the latest numbers from the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

"Many may not consider what they're doing abuse because they're using a prescribed drug," says Susan R.B. Weiss, chief of NIDA's Science Policy Branch. "Many of these medications are being taken as performance-enhancers."

While street drug use has been declining in recent years, prescription drug abuse has been up since the 1990s.

The trend seems to be partly driven by more and more women popping pills. While men make up the majority of abusers of street drugs, including meth, cocaine and heroin, women are just as likely to abuse prescription pills as men.

Studies show that women are more likely — in some cases, 55 percent more likely — to be prescribed an abusable prescription drug, especially narcotics and anti-anxiety drugs.

"Not surprisingly, availability increases abuse patterns," Weiss says.

This alarms some drug abuse experts because women also seem to be more vulnerable to addiction to these types of drugs once they start taking them.

Perfection through pharmaceuticals?
To blame may be what some are calling the superwoman syndrome. Overworked, overwhelmed and overscheduled women juggling families, friends and careers are turning to stimulants, painkillers and anti-anxiety meds to help launch them through endless to-do lists.

"Women load their lives with so much that they get in over their heads, and some turn to prescription pills to cope," says Talia Witkowski, a psychologist in Los Angeles.

Witkowski, 30, began abusing her prescription attention deficit hyperactivity disorder drugs in high school, and has been clean for three years.

"For many women, even those whom you would never suspect, pills offer an escape," she says. But what many women don't realize is that they are conducting a dangerous experiment on their health and their mind.

Start of a secret addiction
After graduating from the Dickinson School of Law at Pennsylvania State University in 1999, Laurie Besden felt overwhelmed by the pressure to pass the bar. So she stole a box of Vicoprofen, which contains the narcotic painkiller hydrocodone, from her ex-boyfriend's father's house and popped two pills. She had heard the medication could offer a burst of energy and ability to focus.

"I had energy to study for 12 hours and then clean the house like a superwoman," recalls the 35-year-old from Plymouth Meeting, Pa. Eventually, her two-a-day habit grew to 20 a day.

After she passed the bar, she tried to quit, but couldn't. "If I didn't take them, I was going to be sick," she says. "I needed the pills to get out of bed so my heart wouldn't go into palpitations."

Then she started a prestigious — and demanding — clerkship, and realized she was completely dependent on her secret stash of pills to get through the day.

For years, she hid this addiction from her friends and family. She no longer even tried to imagine life without her little helpers. Then her source — a doctor who prescribed these pills for any phony condition — had his medical license revoked. Besden figured out how to call in her own prescriptions, using false names and impersonating doctors.

In 2002, she was arrested for the first of what would be five times before she was convicted in 2004 for prescription fraud and jailed for almost a year.

Pills all around
Abuse of prescription drugs has risen right along with increases in the number of prescriptions for stimulants and painkillers seen since the early '90s, experts note. According to IMS Health, a research firm that tracks prescription use, the use of stimulants has nearly tripled over the past decade.

And as the drugs have become more commonplace, our attitude has become increasingly cavalier. After all, if a kid can be given an amphetamine for ADHD, couldn't Mom benefit from a little extra focus, too?

Women aren't just abusing their own prescriptions; they're also dipping into friends' supplies. In one survey, 29 percent of U.S. women admitted to sharing or borrowing somebody else's prescription drugs in their lifetime. This study, published in the Journal of Women's Health, found the rate of borrowing was highest among women ages 18 to 44. That stat is backed by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration's National Survey on Drug Use and Health, which found that the main source of prescription drugs among non-medical users — a whopping 56 percent — was free drugs from friends and family.

The most commonly abused pills are opiod painkillers, stimulants and central nervous depressants, generally used to treat anxiety and sleep disorders. But these drugs are used for specific brain chemical imbalances, and if you are healthy, you risk tweaking your brain's natural abilities to sleep, focus and calm down.

These pills can also undermine your confidence if you begin relying on a pill versus your own strengths and capabilities to get through the day, Weiss says.

Popping too many pills also can trigger an irregular heartbeat and lead to cardiac arrest — and even death. In fact, there's been an exponential rise in the number of unintentional drug poisoning deaths, which spiked nationwide by more than 68 percent between 1999 and 2004, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Accidental overdose often happens when users build up tolerance to the drugs and must take more and more for the same effect.

Another big worry is that these pills can interact with many other common medications. When combined with over-the-counter cold medicine, for instance, stimulants can drive up blood pressure to dangerously high levels.

But the potential for addiction is the most serious consequence, experts warn.

At age 15, Witkowski, the Los Angeles psychologist, started abusing medications including the Ritalin she'd been prescribed. Once she got into college, she began experimenting with other drugs. "I knew I was living a lie, but I couldn't stop," she says. Finally she got help from a treatment program called Heal Your Hunger.

As Witkowski learned, addicts can recover, especially under the guidance of a therapist or program that specializes in addiction.

"An addiction specialist will be able to offer a solid assessment on how much control the addict has lost and what treatment plan is best," says Dr. Ken Thompson, medical director of Caron, an alcohol and drug addiction treatment center headquartered in Wernersville, Pa. He advises women pursue gender-specific treatment.

"Women often have different motivations than men in abusing prescription drugs, and by being in a women's-specific program, they're able to deal with those reasons more effectively," he says.

"This doesn't mean they're always going to suffer or be miserable, but they will have to pay attention to their recovery and do things to support staying clean," Thompson says. At Caron, for instance, addicted women who are in the process of healing are encouraged to eat healthy, exercise, relax and do mind-body activities like yoga.

Dr. Harold C. Urschel III, co-founder of Enterhealth, an addiction recovery program in Dallas, says these are the same strategies he recommends all women follow, especially if they're turning to a pill to relieve stress or anxiety, even just once. "You're cheating yourself when you use a pill," he says.

That's a message Besden has come to accept, especially in jail, which she says saved her life. "I was forced to get clean, something I didn't think would happen until I died," she says. After jail, she sought treatment at Caron where she learned how to live without drugs. Since then she's been rebuilding her life.

Clean now for six years, Besden's had her license to practice law in Pennsylvania reinstated. She's a working attorney in civil law who finds satisfaction in every day activities — like swimming, hanging out with her dog Marcus and helping other lawyers recover from addiction.

Yet she's also an addict in recovery, attending five support meetings weekly and touching base with her sponsor, and hopes she can inspire other women who have a secret addiction to get help. "Getting clean was the hardest thing I've ever done," she says, "but getting clean and maintaining my sobriety is by far the biggest accomplishment of my life."

Karen Asp, a freelance journalist who specializes in fitness, health and nutrition, is a contributing editor for Woman's Day and writes regularly for Self, Prevention, Real Simple, Women's Health, Shape and Men's Fitness.

MSN:Prescription drug abuse ravages state's youth

Kentucky officials see an ‘epidemic’; officials say drugs coming from Florida
By Mark Potter
Correspondent
NBC News
updated 5:17 a.m. PT, Mon., July 6, 2009

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31707246/ns/health-addictions

MOREHEAD, Ky. — Late in the morning last New Year's Day, Sam and Lynn Kissick received a devastating phone call that would tear their lives apart.

The caller informed them their 22-year-old daughter, Savannah, was being rushed by ambulance to the St. Claire Regional Medical Center in Morehead, Ky. She had long battled drug addiction, but it looked like this time, Savannah had overdosed on a combination of painkillers and sedatives while celebrating New Year's Eve.

After racing to the emergency room to be by Savannah's side, her parents were met by a physician with grim news. "I'm sorry, Mr. And Mrs. Kissick, but she didn't make it," he said.

Savannah had just become the latest fatality linked to prescription drug abuse, a fast-growing problem that killed more than 8,500 Americans in 2005, according to the latest available statistics from the Office of National Drug Control Policy.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration says nearly 7 million Americans currently abuse prescription drugs, noting that is "more than the number who are abusing cocaine, heroin, hallucinogens, ecstasy and inhalants combined." The DEA also reports that "opioid painkillers now cause more overdose deaths than cocaine and heroin combined."

"Something needs to be done, because it's killing our kids every day." said Lynn Kissick. "People need to stand up and take notice. Our kids are dying. They're dying because of these drugs."

A regional ‘epidemic’
While the problem exists in every state in the country, Kentucky led the nation in the use of prescription drugs for non-medical purposes during the last year, according to the state's Office of Drug Control Policy. Officials said prescription drug abuse is particularly acute in the cities and rural areas of Eastern Kentucky.

Last year alone, at least 485 people died in Kentucky from prescription drug overdoses, according to the state's Cabinet for Health and Family Services. Medical Examiners' records indicate the drugs most commonly found in those death cases were methadone, the painkillers oxycodone and hydrocodone, alprazolam (Xanax), morphine, diazepam (Valium) and fentanyl.

"It's an epidemic and I'm afraid we're losing a whole generation," said Beth Lewis Maze, the Chief Circuit Judge for the 21st Judicial Circuit in Kentucky. "These pain medications are so highly addictive that these young people are digging themselves a very deep hole."

In the region's newly formed drug court, Maze sees the ravages of prescription drug abuse at all levels of society. "I see good kids from good families, doctors, lawyers, teachers," she said.

Greenup County Coroner Neil Wright calls prescription drug abuse "public enemy number one." Half of the 50 deaths he logged last year were drug related, and "85 to 90 percent" of those calls involved prescription pill overdoses. "It affects everybody. I don't care, rich, poor, educated or non-educated, it affects everybody."

Down the street, Greenup County Sheriff Keith Cooper dug through the many evidence bags his deputies have filled with prescription pill bottles and cash seized during drug arrests.


"We are drowning in a sea of prescription medication," said Cooper, who complained about the skyrocketing number of crimes committed by addicts searching for money to buy painkillers.

"It affects, quite literally, every kind, every type of crime that we have, the burglaries, the thefts, the accidents, the domestic disputes between families. It's breaking families up."

In neighboring Rowan County, where Savannah Kissick died, Chief Deputy Sheriff Roger Holbrook was arrested recently on federal charges that he had conspired to distribute oxycodone.

Crowded rehabilitation clinics
Pastor Wayne Ross runs the Shepherd’s Shelter adult drug and alcohol treatment center in Mount Sterling, Ky. His 50 available beds are filled with residents struggling to recover from drug addiction, almost all of them from prescription pill habits.

Savannah Kissick was one of his clients, and she had graduated from the recovery program. Her return to drug abuse and her death from an overdose shook Ross and the clinic staff members who had worked hard for her success.

"I cried, it breaks my heart," said Ross, who officiated at Savannah's funeral. "She's not the only one. We've been directly involved with five different people who have OD'd. Three of the funerals I did, myself, as a minister. It just breaks my heart."


Kay Fultz, 36, is also from Morehead, Ky. and is currently a resident of the Shepherd’s Shelter who said that at the height of her addiction, she was taking as many as 50 oxycodone pain pills a day and was dealing drugs to support her own habit.

"It just starts out as a party drug, you know, every now and then," Fultz said. "Once you start doing it every day, I mean it just takes compete control of your life."

Finding a prescription drug supply was easy for Fultz. "It's very simple to get. It's everywhere," she said. But once addicted, the costs are severe. "I've lost everything. I've lost everything and it's so easy to do."


Florida connection
During a recent classroom session at his clinic, Ross asked the residents where they bought their prescription drugs. Every person in the room had either traveled to Florida to obtain the medications, or had purchased drugs from someone else who had bought prescription painkillers there.

Florida has become notorious as a destination for addicts and drug dealers from around the southeastern United States. They are drawn to the many pain clinics in Florida, some of which dispense hundreds of painkillers at a time after only a cursory medical exam.

"You can go down there and within 24 hours have everything you need," said Fultz, who added that the medical exam she was given at a Florida pain clinic, where she pretended to suffer from pain, was not at all professional.

"I mean, they look at your MRI, ask you how you are feeling — ‘I'm feeling pretty bad’ — and you leave there with pills."

Sam Kissick, Savannah’s father, believes the drugs that killed his daughter came from Florida.

"From where I'm sitting, it looks like they're handing it out like candy on Halloween," he said. "Anybody that goes down there can come back with carloads of pills, and then they're dumped out on our streets."

To addicts in Kentucky, Florida is “like the promised land,” said Cooper, the Greenup County sheriff.



Local police, federal agents and medical officials in Florida are targeting illicit prescription drug sales. The state legislature recently passed, and Gov. Charlie Crist signed, a law to regulate and monitor pain clinics, although the procedure won't be fully implemented until late next year.

Kentucky and most other states already have such monitoring laws in place, making it much more difficult for addicts and dealers to buy large amounts of prescription medication by going from clinic to clinic – a common practice in Florida.

Families left behind
Karen Shay, a dentist in Morehead, Ky., also knows too well the cost and pain of prescription drug abuse. Two years ago, her 19-year-old daughter, Sarah, died from an overdose after partying with friends, who dropped her body off at a hospital and drove away.

Sarah Shay and Savannah Kissick had been childhood friends.

"We have two young ladies that were beautiful, talented and intelligent, had the world by the tail, could have done anything and they're gone,” Shay said. “They're gone."

In her work, Shay also sees the desperation of drug addicts, some of whom have visited her office seeking pain medication for fake dental problems. Because of Kentucky's prescription monitoring law, Shay is able to run computer checks on patients she suspects of doctor-shopping for painkillers and turns many of them away.

"If [the painkillers are] taken the way they're supposed to be, it's a very powerful, helpful drug. But when they're not taken the way they're supposed to, then it becomes a killer," she said. "It's amazing when you look in the paper, how many people have died from drug abuse. "

During a recent visit to the cemetery where Sarah is interred, Shay cleared away the dying flower petals and placed a colorful pinwheel below her daughter's crypt. Looking upward to the plaque showing Sarah's name and picture, she quietly spoke the words, "Hi, Baby," then bowed her head.

"When you lose somebody like that, it puts a hole in your heart that nothing else will ever fill," she said.


For the Kissicks, whose loss is more recent and raw, anger mingles with grief.

"It's time that people were held accountable for what's happening. I think it's time that someone was held responsible,” Lynn Kissick said.

The parents want to raise awareness about the problem so that others don’t have to endure their pain.

"The drugs, they don't discriminate and it can happen to anybody," said Sam Kissick. "You may never have any idea that your child is exploring or fooling with prescription drugs at all, until they've already gone too far with it."

Sitting at their dining room table recently, Savannah's parents sorted through colorful photographs of their daughter.

"She had a beautiful smile," said Lynn. In a quiet voice, Sam agreed, "That she did."


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