Telling doctors and ER personnel you are a hard drug user

Psychubus

Psychubus

Ex-Bluelighter
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Feb 14, 2006
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If I book an appointment with a doctor, everything is confidential, yes?

If I am at a concert/rave, and something bad happens and I end up having to go to the ER, will I be arrested if under the influence of drugs? Or only arrested if I have drugs on me when I go to the hospital?

I've also heard that if you drive to the hospital, they have the right to search your car. Or they call police if it's an overdose or something, and they have the right to search your car. True or not?
 
Well I know if you have drugs on you, obviously you'll be prosecuted for possession. If you just are under the influence of drugs, I don't think there is any charges that can be brought against you, but don't hold me too it.
 
At the hospital I work at if you are under the influence, they will not call the police unless you are smashing the place up ,and even if you have drugs on your possession they will simply throw them and not alert police unless its a huge amount. hope this helps..
 
^^ That's exactly right (at least in Australia). If you don't have drugs on you, I would say it's a 99.9% chance they don't call the cops. If you have a small amount, over here they would not bother. If you had a large amount, they would most definetely call.
 
doctors are supposed to keep what goes on between patient and doctor secret so just tell them, they wont say anything, there trying ot help
 
I'm in the UK so rules are probably different here. When I worked in Accident and emergency (UK's ER), if we had people come in on drugs then we wouldn't ever inform the police unless it was obvious they still have drugs on them...i.e we wouldn't search thier stuff (unless they came in unconsious), so we wouldn't know if they had drugs unless they told us, or left them or show or something. Even then I think most Drs and nurses would probably just get the drugs destroyed, unless it was a very large amount in which case I think the legal obligation to report it overides any patient confidentiality.

Even if someone decided to inform the police about someone being on drugs, aslong as you have none in your possesion there is nothing they could do anyways.
 
^thats true, its not a crime to be on drugs, its a crime to posses drugs
 
well i live in california, do the same laws apply here?

i heard texas even charges for having drugs in your blood (rofl)
 
delta_9 said:
^thats true, its not a crime to be on drugs, its a crime to posses drugs
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false, I know ppl that have been arrested for being under the influence of a controlled substance.
 
geetered said:
false, I know ppl that have been arrested for being under the influence of a controlled substance.
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they must have been doing something that warranted it, i.e. fucking shit up. if youre minding your own business, im pretty sure cops cant do dick about you being fucked up.
 
Psychubus said:
If I book an appointment with a doctor, everything is confidential, yes?

If I am at a concert/rave, and something bad happens and I end up having to go to the ER, will I be arrested if under the influence of drugs? Or only arrested if I have drugs on me when I go to the hospital?

I've also heard that if you drive to the hospital, they have the right to search your car. Or they call police if it's an overdose or something, and they have the right to search your car. True or not?
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I talked to a doctor about this today. Confidentiality prohibits hospital staff from informing law enforcement of a patient's involvement with illegal drugs. Moreover, many doctors are loathe to get law enforcement involved period. There are certain exceptions to the reporting prohibition, like where a minor is involved in an abuse situation, where doctors are required to call the police. There also might be exceptions for other types of violent crimes. One area where doctors work very closely with law enforcement, though, is prescription fraud. A doctor who values his medical license will report these types of crimes very quickly. But again, these are just things that were told to me in the course of a conversation. If you need actual legal advise about doctor-patient confidentiality, I suggest contacting an attorney.
 
Just throwing a story out there...
A few weeks ago, I attempted suicide by overdosing on Heroin. (Stupid I know, don't give me any lectures) My dad found me a few hours later, blue and such. Gave the cops permission to search my room. They found drug paraphanelia (straws for snorting).

They came to talk to me in the hospital, asking for information- saying they weren't going to charge me etc.etc. They just wanted to know where I got the shit because it was laced with something that made my blood sugar skyrocket to 500+ (normal is 100 or so) I told them it was just a random street dealer... I didn't know the name.

A week or so after I got out of the ICU, I received 2 summons in the mail- for possession of herion, and for possession of paraphanelia. Awesome, right?


Oh... and a few months back, my friends drove me to the ER when I fell out from a fentanyl laced bag. I was taken to a hospital a few towns over and the hospital still called my town's police department to tell them about the OD. The police called and made me come in and asked for information... but didn't charge me. (I'm in NJ if that makes a difference... I guess they're cracking down because of the fent outbreak?)
 
^^ u admitted to the posession i guess when you said you got it from a random....the best rule of thumb is to just say i dont have anything to say
 
GottaGrind$ said:
^^ u admitted to the posession i guess when you said you got it from a random....the best rule of thumb is to just say i dont have anything to say
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Yeah... if I were sober when talking to the po I would've thought twice before saying shit. But I was on 4mg of Ativan (and I'm ~110lb female) because I had some type of reaction from the Narcan... needless to say I wasn't telling any lies.

Shit happens... *shrug* I just thank moses for good NJ PDs - btw, they're dropping the possession and para charges for the suicide attempt.
 
I've been to the ER and they gave me back my weed or they they did'nt look through my pockets. either way I was happy till I got the bill :(
 
Psychubus said:
If I book an appointment with a doctor, everything is confidential, yes?

If I am at a concert/rave, and something bad happens and I end up having to go to the ER, will I be arrested if under the influence of drugs? Or only arrested if I have drugs on me when I go to the hospital?

I've also heard that if you drive to the hospital, they have the right to search your car. Or they call police if it's an overdose or something, and they have the right to search your car. True or not?
Click to expand...


Ive been to the doctors for several OD and made it out fine...My primary physician also knows that I am a hard drug user...He keeps it confidential, but it can show up on your medical records warning about perscriptions and such( but only if you have actively abused a script that a dr has written you i think, that was the case with me).
 
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