Prescription (medicine)

“ Humourous from [21] one point of view but quite perturbing for a physician was the innocent disregard for the directions left with medicines; indeed the doctor could never tell whether the failure of a prescription was due to the ineffectiveness of the drugs or to the failure of the patient to take the medicine as prescribed, for he found that the patient was liable to take the whole potion at once or just as liable to have another member of the family take the remedy vicariously. ”

“ This conduct, though sacred in the eyes of our ancestors, appears ridiculous enough to us; and doubtless some parts of ours will seem as strange to posterity. Among these we may reckon the present mode of medical prescription, which, we venture to affirm, will sometime hence appear to have been completely ridiculous, and a very high burlesque upon the common sense of mankind. ”

“ The honesty of each being presupposed, such a charge as the substitution of an inferior article for some ingredient in a prescription, or the false insinuation that a mistake in the medicine is due to the compounder’s carelessness need not be raised. Let us consider the grievances of each against the other.
The physician complains that the apothecary exceeds his function by prescribing for the sick. A person applies to the pharmacist for a remedy for a specified disease. ”

“ The fact that almost all our medicines, whether in the condition in which we see them labelled at the apothecary's shop, or as prescribed by the family physician, have Latin names,—was often quoted in proof of this aristocratic feeling and tendency.
Now there was doubtless some foundation for this opinion. Medical men did then and still very generally do believe, that it is better, on the whole, for the mass of mankind to have nothing to do with these matters, except at the prescription of those who have given the best part of their lives to the study of [Pg 254] medicine and disease. ”

“ Prescriptions may be filled but once, and no copy may be given, except to an officer of the law, and the drug must be delivered in a container labeled with the serial number of the prescription, with the date when filled and the name of the person for whose use the medicine is intended, the name of the physician, and the name and address of the dispenser. ”

“ Because one particular drug or medicine benefits a certain person should not be considered as evidence that it will aid another. The habit of borrowing prescriptions is dangerous. The intelligent physician writes a prescription, which will benefit his patient, and the same prescription would be of no benefit, and might be of positive injury, to another. Many of the testimonials given to patent medicines are genuine and are written by honest persons. ”

“ I introduce this case to shew how sick men are often treated, after their keeper consents to give them medicine. He complained of not being very well, and was taken to his room, and ordered to take an emetic. This is a prescription for every thing, and is designed as a punishment rather than a remedy. The room was cold, and he was left alone to undergo the medicine. The emetics are generally given in great and unusual quantities, that the effect may be the more painful, and how many have been killed by such prescriptions, the day of Judgment will publish. ”

“ No one but a physician holding a permit may issue a prescription for liquor. And no physician is allowed to prescribe it unless, upon an examination or the best information obtainable, he believes its use as a medicine is necessary and will afford relief from some known ailment. No more than a pint of spirituous liquor shall be prescribed for the same person within ten days, and no prescription shall be filled more than once. ”

“ Doctor—'s professional indignation had pretty well burned itself out by this time; so he took up the case again, and once more gave a prescription. In a couple of days, the gentleman was quite well again; but that Mrs.—'s cordial cost him twenty dollars.
He is now a little wiser than he was before; and is very careful as to whose prescriptions he takes. It would be better for the health of the entire community if every individual would be as careful in the same matter as he is now. Those who are sick should, ere taking medicine, consult a physician of experience and skill ”

“ Two men scarcely ever write the same prescription for the same disease or the same symptom. I have watched the art of prescribing for fifty years, and I am quite sure that divergence of treatment is at this moment far greater than it ever was in the course of that long period. ”

“ As a general rule, we believe, Physicians have no objection to their patients knowing the remedies they prescribe, particularly when the patients themselves are people of sense and information, but in many instances, of what use would it be to the sick man and his conclave of friends to be able to spell {63} out the ingredients of a prescription? ”

“ With some 500 inhabitants in our settlement with quite a number of cases, some of them very serious, there has never been a physician called to prescribe one single prescription to any of these people, and I have an idea that if we were to look at them to-day we would find them equally healthy with those of the adjacent town where there are several physicians with two drug stores to draw their supplies from. ”

“ The assertion that an ex­tem­por­aneous compound prescription even if identical in composition with the Chichester pill is often inert, is absurd and a reprehensible attack by suggestion of the ideal that the physician shall write his prescription to meet the individual needs of his patient and that the pharmacist shall compound the prescriptions of the physician as they are required. ”

“ The physician knows well that the opportunities which are presented to him of intervening effectually to cut short the processes of disease by the use of specific cures are not very numerous, and that often enough the justification Page 164 for his prescription is the soothing effect which it may exercise upon the mind of the patient, who, believing either in the physician or in his remedy, finds confidence and patience till recovery ensues. ”

“ Prescribing a walk for a patient whose legs are already vigorous, but whose arms and shoulders are contracted and weak, is like prescribing a medicine because it is a medicine, without regard to the nature of the malady. ”

“ Such term does not include a pharmacy that dispenses prescription medications to patients primarily through the mail, nursing home pharmacies, long-term care facility pharmacies, hospital pharmacies, clinics, charitable or not-for-profit pharmacies, government pharmacies, or pharmacy benefit managers. ”

“ Have we not ingenious Physicians [227] and Surgeons, who act in public, not only to their own honour, but that of their country, and are, by their transcendant skill, become inimitable in all the world? Are not some disappointed in the success of a prescription from the most judicious hand? ”

“ A patient comes to the city for the purpose of consulting some experienced physician for a certain complaint. Probably he gets a prescription, with instructions to go to a certain respectable druggist or apothecary in town to have the [Pg 73] necessary medicines put up. Of course a respectable physician knows of a reliable apothecary. The patient, in nine cases out of ten, desires to retain the prescription, and often does so. He goes to another drug store, more convenient, for a second quantity of the same ”

“ WORLD'S DISPENSARY MEDICAL ASSOCIATION, Buffalo, N.Y.:
Mrs. Inman.
Gentlemen—I began taking "Favorite Prescription" about a year ago. For years I have suffered with falling and ulceration of the womb, but to-day, I am enjoying perfect health.
I took four bottles of the "Prescription" and two of the "Golden Medical Discovery." Every lady suffering from female weakness should try the "Prescription" and "Golden Medical Discovery." ”

“ There’s the combination for safety, results and satisfaction.—Rose Drug Co., St. Joseph, Mo.
Recovery Is Doubtful if the quality of the Drugs and Medicines given a patient is not above doubt.
We spare no effort in obtaining the purest and most reliable goods. Efficiency is dependent upon freshness in almost all Drugs, and all Prescriptions are compounded from Drugs which have not deteriorated through age.
Accuracy is the strong feature of our Prescription Department.—The White Cross Pharmacy, Rutland, Vt. ”

“ These are constructed by the practitioner at the moment, and may be either arrangements altogether new, or officinal preparations with additions, or modifications. Too much importance cannot be assigned to the Art which thus enables the physician to adopt and graduate a powerful remedy to each particular case by a prompt and accurate prescription ”

“ A gentleman afflicted with rheumatism consulted a physician, who immediately wrote him a prescription. As the patient was going away the doctor called him back. "By the way, sir, should my prescription happen to afford you any relief, please to let me know, as I am myself suffering from a similar affection, and have tried in vain to cure it." ”

“ Some family physicians, who are nothing more than diagnosing agents for the specialists, and who, when called in to see the sick, immediately consult a specialist, with the result that in about 50 per cent. of the cases the subject generally finds his or her way into the hospital. The great number of dispensaries in our community, with their indiscriminate service and consequent unbridled abuse, is another cause for the falling off in the prescription business. ”

“ It is unnecessary to multiply examples in proof of the numerous errors into which a physician must unavoidably fall, who presumes to compose prescriptions without a knowledge of the chemical habitudes of the different substances which he combines. The file of every apothecary would furnish a volume of instances, where the ingredients of the prescription are fighting together in the dark, or at least are so adverse to each other, as to constitute a most incongruous and chaotic mass. ”

“ In reference to the patronage on the part of Physicians of particular apothecaries, we are of opinion, as a general rule, that Graduates in Pharmacy should be encouraged in preference to others of the same date of business, and whilst admitting the abstract right of the physician to send his prescription where he pleases, we think that justice should dictate the propriety of his encouraging the nearest apothecary deserving of his confidence and that of the patient. ”

“ The Doctors employed differ so essentially in opinion, that, as it frequently falls out on many other consultations, they may lose their patient while debating on the prescription:—in truth, I don’t see how the Doctors can ever agree, as the prescribers must necessarily take the assay ”

“ A specialist sometimes receives fifty to one hundred dollars for prescribing in a case, for which another physician, in ordinary practice, would charge but an office fee of two to ten dollars. A quack specialist—and an impostor—in the latter city makes his brags that he has received twelve hundred dollars for one prescription. ”

“ They are equally unanimous in prescribing the remedy, by which this happy effect is to be produced. The prescription is no sooner made known, however, than a number of persons interpose, and, without denying the reality or danger of the disorder, assure the patient that the prescription will be poison to his constitution, and forbid him, under pain of certain death, to make use of it. Might not the patient reasonably demand, before he ventured to follow this advice, that the authors of it should at least agree among themselves on some other remedy to be substituted? ”

“ The term `filling new prescriptions for controlled substances in schedule III, IV, or V' means filling a prescription for an individual for a controlled substance in schedule III, IV, or V, if-- ` (A) the pharmacy dispensing that prescription has previously dispensed to the patient a controlled substance other than by means of the Internet and pursuant to the valid prescription of a practitioner that meets the applicable requirements of subsections (b) and (c) of section 309 (in this paragraph referred to as the `original prescription') ”

“ Every country has its peculiar medicine as well as its religion, and in every country there are certain family receipts, certain homely prescriptions, which, from their experienced efficacy, merit more attention than a member of the faculty would be inclined to give them. My host at Clermont accordingly became my physician, and by his advice I bathed my feet in warm water, and getting into bed between the blankets, after drinking about a quart of cold spring-water, I can only say that the remedy had its full effect. ”

“ As used in this subsection: ` (A) The term `valid prescription' means a prescription that is issued for a legitimate medical purpose in the usual course of professional practice by-- ` (i) a practitioner who has conducted at least 1 in-person medical evaluation of the patient; or ` (ii) a covering practitioner. ` (B) (i) The term `in-person medical evaluation' means a medical evaluation that is conducted with the patient in the physical presence of the practitioner, without regard to whether portions of the evaluation are conducted by other health professionals. ”

“ The period, as he reckoned it, would prove to be long enough to satisfy the law as to prescription; it was very unlikely that any document existed—or anyhow could be found—which would serve to explain away the presumption which uses such as this gave. ”

“ All drugs are more or less adulterated; and as not more than one physician in a hundred has sufficient knowledge in chemistry to detect impurities, the physician seldom knows just how much of a remedy he is prescribing. ”