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Prescription Monitoring Systems in the US: NarX Score

RoaminW

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Joined
Jul 28, 2022
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116
Everyone really needs to read this! This stuff is CRAZY!

I have been on a mission for about the last week trying to find out the ins and outs of how PMP systems are operated. More specifically, how the NarX scores are tabulated.

If you have a bad credit score at a credit reporting agency that’s unfair, you can file an addendum to the bad report that will allow future creditors will see when they are seeing if they want to issue you some credit. No such avenue exists in this situation with our NarX scores.

The algorithms used to figure out scores are proprietary. Nobody can explain how they are tabulated. Not even doctors or pharmacists know exactly how it is done. They just know the general things that the scores reflect, like numbers of pharmacies or doctors that are used, specific drugs used in the catagories, etc. Not even the Texas Department of Public Safety, that administers the PMP program, knows how they are tabulated. The filled prescriptions part of the PMP program is the main body of of the system, but the NarX scores part of the system is an adjacent part of the PMP that is done through a private for-profit company called Bamboo. Their algorithm is private (proprietary). They won’t divulge how the scores are tabulated.

I can pay $50 for my PMP record from the state but it won’t include my current NarX scores, or what they have been, to where I can ascertain what the scores have done through time to get a sense of how they work. My report would only tell me of the prescriptions I’ve filled in the last two years, which is useless because I know what I’ve gotten.

While I’ve been investigating this, I’ve been made aware of the “social credit system” used in China where if you do things that show you are a good communist, your score will be higher, and anything considered not being a good communist causes lower scores. There’s nothing that a citizen can do to combat what their score is. This NarX scoring part of the PMP system IS THE EXACT SAME TYPE OF THING! This should concern everyone.

There are three categories in Texas. They are opiate, sedative, and stimulant. Plus, there is also an overall score that supposedly expresses what your chances are to die by accidental overdose. My opiate score is 420. My sedative score is 491. On both of these scores, the last number indicates the amount of prescriptions you have filled in the last month. “0” indicates none, and “1” indicates one prescription. That part of the scoring is researchable, but there the list ends. My stimulant score must be 0 because the pharmacist said the first two categories are all he sees besides the next score of 300. My overall chance of overdose score is 300. These scores go from 0 - 990.

Does anyone reading this know of any other little things that these systems do that tabulate NarX scores, or what my specific scores mean? I’m attempting to collect all the info I can about this bullshit system of prescription TYRANNY that I live under in the US, and more specifically, the state of Texas.

TIA…

***************************************************************


NarX Score Collective Project




I’d like to put together a project for the NarX scores that we are forced to live under. Both my doctor, and a pharmacist, told me my current NarX scores. I can’t find out what the scores have been, from month to month, for the last two years, which is reportedly as far back as these PMP records go back. I’m certain older stuff doesn’t get expunged like they claim, though.

I’d like for us to get our scores as they are upon picking up our medicine, and then post them on this thread, so we can start to see how they change over time. Like I said, the pharmacist had no issues with telling me what they are. This will give all of us that are concerned about this tyrannical discriminatory system, an idea of how they work, and by extension, show us why we may be having the troubles we have with getting the care we are being denied.

Even if nobody wants to participate, I will be logging my scores on this thread monthly, but I hope we have more input from others. We’ll know about this stuff much quicker with more participation.

My scores right now are:

1. Opiate = 420
2. Sedative = 491
3. Stimulant = 0
4. Overall score that reflects the chances of me dying by accidental OD = 300
(After this entry #4 will be denoted using “OD” for now on.)

I hope y’all join in this quest with me.
 
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I assume NarX is sort of a negative credit score but about narcotics? Never heard that term before (but I'm not living in the US either). In most EU countries people can still go doctor shopping, afaik there is no such surveillance. What an insult of privacy!
 
I assume NarX is sort of a negative credit score but about narcotics? Never heard that term before (but I'm not living in the US either). In most EU countries people can still go doctor shopping, afaik there is no such surveillance. What an insult of privacy!
I believe the term “NarX” is the term that the for-profit company, Bamboo, coined. But yes, the more often, and the stronger the med, the higher the score. The idea is a fair one to stop so much rampant misuse, but they’ve gone too fucking far with it. The secrecy of how that NarX score is tabulated, and the fact that a patient doesn’t have the ability to look into how their scores are the way they are is tyrannical in nature. I’m not done with this. My teeth and talons are in it! I’m going to disrupt this bullshit.
 
Someone needs to file civil cases against these.. they are based off BS in my opinion. Someone needs to take physicians who use this to deny medication to court for malpractice. That and malpractice for denying medication for unrelated substance; cutting people flat off medication for a hot MJ piss is a great example of how clueless the medical profession is when it comes to substance abuse.. they have to be held accountable for their utter incompetence and the results it has on people’s lives.
 
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Someone needs to file civil cases against these.. they are based off BS in my opinion. Someone needs to take physicians who use this to court for malpractice. That and malpractice for denying medication and cutting people flat off medication for a hot MJ piss.. they have to be held accountable for their utter incompetence and the results it has on people’s lives.
I couldn’t agree more! I wish I could get this thread to be one that everyone that logs onto this site is prompted to read. What this is, is a good case for a class action suit where many people join to create a civil case to be determined by a court of law. This secrecy needs to be halted. The standard Prescription Monitoring Program works just fine without having to tabulate a scoring system.
 
PS. Im near certain that banks and credit agencies have secret databases on people. Anyone care to elaborate ? I suspect the IRS compiles insane databases also (and gets info from the intel agencies).
90's there are so many different entities compiling everyones info at this point id just kiss the idea of privacy goodby.

Fuck em
 
Everyone really needs to read this! This stuff is CRAZY!

I have been on a mission for about the last week trying to find out the ins and outs of how PMP systems are operated. More specifically, how the NarX scores are tabulated.

If you have a bad credit score at a credit reporting agency that’s unfair, you can file an addendum to the bad report that will allow future creditors will see when they are seeing if they want to issue you some credit. No such avenue exists in this situation with our NarX scores.

The algorithms used to figure out scores are proprietary. Nobody can explain how they are tabulated. Not even doctors or pharmacists know exactly how it is done. They just know the general things that the scores reflect, like numbers of pharmacies or doctors that are used, specific drugs used in the catagories, etc. Not even the Texas Department of Public Safety, that administers the PMP program, knows how they are tabulated. The filled prescriptions part of the PMP program is the main body of of the system, but the NarX scores part of the system is an adjacent part of the PMP that is done through a private for-profit company called Bamboo. Their algorithm is private (proprietary). They won’t divulge how the scores are tabulated.

I can pay $50 for my PMP record from the state but it won’t include my current NarX scores, or what they have been, to where I can ascertain what the scores have done through time to get a sense of how they work. My report would only tell me of the prescriptions I’ve filled in the last two years, which is useless because I know what I’ve gotten.

While I’ve been investigating this, I’ve been made aware of the “social credit system” used in China where if you do things that show you are a good communist, your score will be higher, and anything considered not being a good communist causes lower scores. There’s nothing that a citizen can do to combat what their score is. This NarX scoring part of the PMP system IS THE EXACT SAME TYPE OF THING! This should concern everyone.

There are three categories in Texas. They are opiate, sedative, and stimulant. Plus, there is also an overall score that supposedly expresses what your chances are to die by accidental overdose. My opiate score is 420. My sedative score is 491. On both of these scores, the last number indicates the amount of prescriptions you have filled in the last month. “0” indicates none, and “1” indicates one prescription. That part of the scoring is researchable, but there the list ends. My stimulant score must be 0 because the pharmacist said the first two categories are all he sees besides the next score of 300. My overall chance of overdose score is 300. These scores go from 0 - 990.

Does anyone reading this know of any other little things that these systems do that tabulate NarX scores, or what my specific scores mean? I’m attempting to collect all the info I can about this bullshit system of prescription TYRANNY that I live under in the US, and more specifically, the state of Texas.

TIA…
Thank you for taking the trouble to look into this. Thanks for sharing what you learned.
 
90's there are so many different entities compiling everyones info at this point id just kiss the idea of privacy goodby.

Fuck em
When I needed needed confirmation from a former employer about what dates I had worked there, they referred me to a website. This website collects data on where you worked, when you worked there and how much you got paid you every pay period. I was astonished! They literally knew more about me than I remembered about myself. Employers pay to participate in this thing. Other entities pay to access it. I got to look for free, same as how you can see credit reports free after you get denied credit. I've had a lot of different jobs. They didn't list every single job, but they listed most of them, even very short term oned. You pretty much cannot disguise your work history anymore, despite how they tell you to be selective about what you put on a resume.
 
Everyone really needs to read this! This stuff is CRAZY!

I have been on a mission for about the last week trying to find out the ins and outs of how PMP systems are operated. More specifically, how the NarX scores are tabulated.

If you have a bad credit score at a credit reporting agency that’s unfair, you can file an addendum to the bad report that will allow future creditors will see when they are seeing if they want to issue you some credit. No such avenue exists in this situation with our NarX scores.

The algorithms used to figure out scores are proprietary. Nobody can explain how they are tabulated. Not even doctors or pharmacists know exactly how it is done. They just know the general things that the scores reflect, like numbers of pharmacies or doctors that are used, specific drugs used in the catagories, etc. Not even the Texas Department of Public Safety, that administers the PMP program, knows how they are tabulated. The filled prescriptions part of the PMP program is the main body of of the system, but the NarX scores part of the system is an adjacent part of the PMP that is done through a private for-profit company called Bamboo. Their algorithm is private (proprietary). They won’t divulge how the scores are tabulated.

I can pay $50 for my PMP record from the state but it won’t include my current NarX scores, or what they have been, to where I can ascertain what the scores have done through time to get a sense of how they work. My report would only tell me of the prescriptions I’ve filled in the last two years, which is useless because I know what I’ve gotten.

While I’ve been investigating this, I’ve been made aware of the “social credit system” used in China where if you do things that show you are a good communist, your score will be higher, and anything considered not being a good communist causes lower scores. There’s nothing that a citizen can do to combat what their score is. This NarX scoring part of the PMP system IS THE EXACT SAME TYPE OF THING! This should concern everyone.

There are three categories in Texas. They are opiate, sedative, and stimulant. Plus, there is also an overall score that supposedly expresses what your chances are to die by accidental overdose. My opiate score is 420. My sedative score is 491. On both of these scores, the last number indicates the amount of prescriptions you have filled in the last month. “0” indicates none, and “1” indicates one prescription. That part of the scoring is researchable, but there the list ends. My stimulant score must be 0 because the pharmacist said the first two categories are all he sees besides the next score of 300. My overall chance of overdose score is 300. These scores go from 0 - 990.

Does anyone reading this know of any other little things that these systems do that tabulate NarX scores, or what my specific scores mean? I’m attempting to collect all the info I can about this bullshit system of prescription TYRANNY that I live under in the US, and more specifically, the state of Texas.

TIA…
Wow. This is great information. I’m in Canada and I do not know what our equivalent.to your NarX score is called… but I’d assume we’ve got something rolling like this. We have a different set of standards and full tracking between all pharmacies regarding the dispense of any narcotic which must be coded into at pos with your photo ID needed for a pharmacy to legally “know” who you are…

Got to stop there for a second to ask if has anyone EVER heard of anything in any mandate or policy or law where an ID Check can be avoided when it’s obviously your 80 year old mother with her TOTAL FULL BLACK face tattoos and horns and she comes by for her badnarcotix on the daily?? If you can ID someone by being familiar with regular daily and same time frame pickups for the same script, or their new changed script, or anything.. why do you HAVE to ID always at a pharmacy for an ID if you like,

“I know who he is.‘

The magistrate issued a concerned look for a question with an innate attachment to common sense…or so he hoped. 5,000 years of being waterboarded for breakfast before routine torture plagued the pharmacists mind. He already felt sentenced there to thoughts of his ‘horrendous’ infraction.

‘Well. I don’t fucking give a SHIT what anyone thinks. The particular store policy and the LAW…of which I have a copy of in my hand……’

‘WE AND ALL HUMANITY IS LEGALLY REQUIRED TO PRESCRIBE YOU TO 5,000 YEARS OF SIMULATED DEATH’


The pharmacist would tell anyone..

Well.. we mean - if he could communicate in anything other than agonized screams of being tortured in an advanced system of supermax pain levels…

Don’t dispense these narcotics as prescribed to ANYONE unless you have carded them. Not even your own mother as he did.

Now she has to live with having a failure for a son

Forever, or 5,000 years lol.
 
The law and things like mandate and policy in any institution or even a work place is generally considered to be an infallible must here in Canada.

Did I just get a reader who thought this isnot serious?

It’s the LAW.

10,000 years by the LAW OF SENTENCING ALL PEOPLES OF ANY AND ALL OF BEING ALIVE AND ON THIS FUCKING EARTH?

Canada is involved in international standards you know.

(Oh canadaaaaa. Our home and native LAAAAWS)

Sorry just doing my mandated dissemination of patriotism 2.0 it’s the fucking CANADA.
 
When I needed needed confirmation from a former employer about what dates I had worked there, they referred me to a website. This website collects data on where you worked, when you worked there and how much you got paid you every pay period. I was astonished! They literally knew more about me than I remembered about myself. Employers pay to participate in this thing. Other entities pay to access it. I got to look for free, same as how you can see credit reports free after you get denied credit. I've had a lot of different jobs. They didn't list every single job, but they listed most of them, even very short term oned. You pretty much cannot disguise your work history anymore, despite how they tell you to be selective about what you put on a resume.
On the internet. On any given website, any and all. You’ve got cookies and all kinds of work whether you know or not for a shitload of companies all at once to build on their profile of you. This enables them to better target ads at you for a penny on a click. product development, and all kinds of anything they want to do with it.

They are not all going to follow any rules (if there really even are any that are about your comfort around this as the individual, right now, and truly

Even your debit card swipes are collected into info systems from anything anywhere like.. what sells at McDonalds?

Cross that to any footage they may or may. It be able to get via store cameras and now I’ve got your name, location, at what time, and what did you PREFER to buy, and anything else I may be able to infer here…

This is being sold to data brokers of all sorts, like

‘who care how many cause I am making MONEY!’

They’ve got a whole shit load of leverage and technical mumbo jumbo to organize your life to anywhere it goes…

I think that the concept of any actual privacy is actually a thing of the past and it was quite awhile ago too…… the advent of the smartphone was probably the last strike down on true blackout privacy on planet Earth if you want to live in anything like an actual human residence at all….

Activism toward privacy laws should be with regard to being to guard your right to peace of mind.. but tbh actual privacy is toast if your small town CCTV camera in any place is on or if you own any tech which connects online at all?

Might be a more convincing way to make a guest reader actually feel as exposed as they are for a second and then we all reconsider how we deploy all of our technologies worldwide,..
 
Gonna shoot this over to the Dive. It isn't Basic Drugs material.

Good thread though albeit I have never heard of the company ( or the practice ) so it must be a Texas thing or something down South.
 
Gonna shoot this over to the Dive. It isn't Basic Drugs material.

Good thread though albeit I have never heard of the company ( or the practice ) so it must be a Texas thing or something down South.
All 50 states use PMP programs these days. I think I read that 37 of them use the NarX scoring system.

What is the Dive?
 
Here is the letter I sent to my representative from my area. He’s one of the good guys but I don’t think he’ll make a move on anything.

“Rep. Middleton, good day. This thing I’m dealing with is going to cause me to write a detailed, and therefore, lengthy explanation. I feel so strongly about this that I will do that. The subject line is what this is about. I believe I’ve found some really large and intractable problems with this system.

First, let me say that a monitoring system was needed. It’s a good idea that works, but I believe it needs some legal attenuations to dial it in correctly.

I’ll be 51 years old in mid January. I have been regularly prescribed a benzodiazepine medication (Temazepam) for years now for chronic insomnia.

The problem I’ve ran into is akin to accidentally kicking the top off an ant hill. I have been having these episodes of Pleurisy in the last few months where I’ve awoken from sleeping and I find it incredibly painful to inhale, cough, and even to roll over in bed. The second time it happened, I felt like I had a temp, but I didn’t feel good enough to get out of bed to find the thermometer. When my wife came home, she got it and I was running a temp of 101.1. I went to the urgent care place in Mont Belvieu (Patients ER). I was there for several hours while they ran tests. They were able to give me something in an IV that broke my temp, and with everything coming back normal except white blood cell count, they sent me home. They forwarded 3 prescriptions to my usual H‑E‑B pharmacy. One was prescription Ibuprofen, another was some sort of corticosteroid cycle for inflammation, and the third was for a whopping 2 ounces of a cough syrup that contained codeine. It is this last one that that has caused this problem to reveal itself. Below is a report/complaint that I filed with the Texas State Board of Pharmacy. It is only the first problem that I’ve experienced. Below it will be the second issue pertaining to the PMP NarX Score system.

“On 10/17/22, Kabria (the pharmacist on duty the next morning) told me a thing that wasn’t factual and it set into motion a chain of events that caused me much anguish and the inability to use that pharmacy. She told me that their pharmacy didn’t carry the medicine named Phenergan W/ Codeine, and that if I, as the patient, were to call any other pharmacy and ask if the carried it, I’d be told no. That the only way that I’ll be able to get it is if I have the prescribing doctor call around and find out who carries it, and send the prescription to them. No doctor is going to find a pharmacy like that. It would be way too time consuming.
When I spoke with the pharmacy manager, Allison Hill, she told me that both the Texas State Board of Pharmacy, and the DEA, sent promulgated letters out to all pharmacies instructing them to do this with patients whom may call and ask if they carry that medicine.
I called both agencies and inquired about if they had sent those letters out. Both agencies said that not only did they not send any such letter, but that they wouldn’t send any such letter. Both agencies told me that same thing. They didn’t, and wouldn’t, send a letter like that. I believe at the very least, this Board wouldn’t approve of pharmacists referencing this Board in a blatant lie such as this. They used both agency’s as a tool to lie to a patient. I also believe that they may have breached their professional obligations towards a patient. Certainly dishonesty is something that their higher pedigree and professional obligations to patients is frowned upon, if not strictly against the duties their licensure demands of them. I was very ill when this happened and it caused me way more distress and literal suffering than I was already dealing with. The first pharmacist lied, and (then) her boss further injured me by trying to convince me by saying that this is something that this Board and the DEA told them to tell folks, which is something absolutely untrue. (Speaking again to the manager) Allison Hill told me that since I called both of these agencies to see if these letters were factual, I obviously didn’t trust them, so they will now refuse me the service of this most convenient pharmacy, which I have stayed with since the store opened. I don’t trust them, but yet they are telling me things that have proven untrustworthy? Please perform any actions that this Board feels is necessary in response to this horrible miscarriage of trust by these licensee’s who have certainly not adhered to the spirit of cooperation and trust that’s supposed to exist towards patients per their licensure and professional obligations. They seem to be fully utilizing the privileges of their license, but not utilizing their understood responsibility towards those that depend on them.” [End]

I fully agree with the professional discretion afforded to pharmacists. I, too, have a federal license to work on aircraft that specifically lays out the privileges and limitations of my FAA ratings. I’ve spoken to two doctors, and 4 pharmacists from different pharmacies about this. None of them agree that any pharmacy is, from a perspective of policy, unable to get any legal medication. What I can’t figure out is why the lie was told. They certainly did not have to make up a story to politely refuse to fill a prescription for me. Because they did lie, I have sought out what really happened that day, and this brings us to the DPS PMP systems’ faults.

I knew about the monitoring program on a basic level. I did not know about the NarX Scoring system. When I told my doctor about this happening on Monday, during a regular scheduled Tele-visit (Zoom), I asked him to tell me what my NarX score was. It is currently 300 overall, and it is made up of two different types of medication tabulations, out of the 3 possible medication classes. I have an opiate score of 420, and a sedative score of 491. The 1 at the end of that last score is indicative of having one prescription that I currently have. I get a compliment of Tylenol IV’s from my general practitioner from time to time for the as-needed use during episodes of my lower back flaring up. I think I filled that prescription in late August, but I don’t understand why that score is so high. It’s certainly NOT that strong of a medicine, and it is filled very sporadically as someone with my malady would need. For it to even be in the same ballpark as my sedative medication for sleep is really odd. They use those two numbers to come up with an overall score of 300. This has naturally caused me to search out the understanding of this NarX system. It is in this crux that I have found the major problems.

For instance, I can’t find out how these scores are tabulated. The TX DPS PMP call-takers, nor the Bamboo internet program this is all done on, can not answer that question. They also can’t answer what the score would be when I next fill either type of medications the systems tracks. I can pay $50 for my PMP record, but it won’t have the current scores, nor have the history of these scores so that I may get a sense of how and why they change. If I have a bad credit score, I can file an addendum to the credit system that has it and combat any score I don’t think is fair or correct. That, then, can be seen by other creditors that may issue credit to me. No such recourse exists for this NarX score.

I am prescribed two 30mg Temazepam (they come in 15 and 30mg) per night. They come in capsules only. It is a short duration medication. That’s why I get two per day if I need them. Since they are capsules only in this country, I can’t break them in half to take a half of one. I therefore asked my doctor, a good while ago, to please prescribe me the 15mg so I can take a “half” of one if I’ve got two or three hours of sleep time left. Just to be clear, I now get 120 15mg per month for my very real and since 2007, problem. A pharmacists doesn’t know this. They just see an inordinate amount prescribed to me, where most intermittent insomniacs will usually get 30 of either the 15 or 30 mg capsules for a month supply. Of course my usual H‑E‑B pharmacists knew what was going on, but I can no longer use them through absolutely no fault of mine. I got them filled at the local Walmart this last time since all this happened, but then the manager of that pharmacy called me afterwards and said they’d no longer fill that amount for me. Can you perhaps see where this is going? Using different pharmacies makes my NarX score rise, from what I’ve read, and now I’ve got to find a pharmacy in a couple of weeks that will fill my inordinate, but common (history-wise) medication. It will be asking a pharmacist to fill my medication that was filled from a different company last month, and a different one the month before that. It is quickly verging into a situation where I may not be able to get it filled, or at least filled on time. I asked my prescribing doctor if it would be better to call and ask if this pharmacy, or that pharmacy, will fill it, but with the system in place that’s ongoing these days, I think I’ll get told no by leery pharmacists. The other option is to pick one, let my doctor send it there, and then when it’s time to fill it, see if they’ll do it. If they don’t, I will simply run out of medication until I somehow negotiate the filling of it from somewhere. It is worth mentioning that this also has the effect of tending to make a person feel like some sort of junkie when, in my case, this isn’t that. All of this because a doctor tried to prescribe to me 2 ounces of the most proper medication for my ailment. It is also a medication I’ve never been prescribed, and to date, never been able to get filled for the first time.

I can understand why my sedative score is where it is, but for the life of me, I don’t know why the other score is even close to it. Nobody can explain it to me. There’s no path for redressing the score. The only people that can tell me require that I have a DEA number for permission to prescribe or dispense medication. And apparently pharmacists have so much pressure on them that they feel like they have to blatantly lie to patients, and in that situation, the patient can’t even find out why the hell they lied. Everyone is covered, and even hidden, except for the patient!

In my opinion, the NarX score system should be totally done away with, while leaving the other parts of the very needed PMP system alone. Or the scoring system should be made more easily understood by laypeople like myself, and then also offer a path of patient input that some of these things can be countered, or even be scrubbed from the score.

In the midst of all of this, I happened upon the knowledge of the China “social credit system”. As crazy as something like that feels to Americans, and even more so by Texans, I can’t help but draw the parallels to the system that’s up and running, that I’ve fallen prey to, here in my beloved state of Texas! I’m old enough to recall that computers were supposed to make our lives better. Clearly, this has escaped that notion.

Please address this failing with appropriate legislation, or tell me why you won’t or don’t think it needs changing. If you need any of this verified, simply call the DPS as nothing more than a citizen and ask them the questions I can’t get answered. It is purely bewilderment.

Best Regards,”
 
Hey Roamin....I understand that drug monitoring is nationwide. All States participate. Just haven't heard of NarX is all.

The dive is a sub forum where things are discussed that have political, social and moral issues that are of value to others.
 
When I needed needed confirmation from a former employer about what dates I had worked there, they referred me to a website. This website collects data on where you worked, when you worked there and how much you got paid you every pay period. I was astonished! They literally knew more about me than I remembered about myself. Employers pay to participate in this thing. Other entities pay to access it. I got to look for free, same as how you can see credit reports free after you get denied credit. I've had a lot of different jobs. They didn't list every single job, but they listed most of them, even very short term oned. You pretty much cannot disguise your work history anymore, despite how they tell you to be selective about what you put on a resume.
Do you know the name of the system that you looked at?
 
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