The prescribed drug abuse and diversion from using the prescribed dosage continue to be a serious problem nationwide. The action of visiting various doctors, deceiving them to acquire controlled substances is prohibited and its one way of obtaining access to prescribed drugs. Conferring the existing literature doctor shopping differ from 6.3 to 56 per cent. Nonetheless, this inconsistency is partly attributable to research methods including the patient sample and the definition of doctor shopping. In this paper, I will explore the literature review on doctor shopping, describe various methodologies, study subjects, assumptions, limitations, plan implementation, and describe the gaging of success and failure on in doctor shopping.
Literature Review
The rate of doctors shopping varies worldwide at a rate of 6.3 to 56 per cent. In a Canadian research, the frequency of patients who visited multiple healthcare sites in a sole ailment was 18 per cent. Additionally, in a Japanese study 1088 outpatients participated in a questionnaire and 23 per cent of the participants acknowledged doctors shopping (Sansome & Sansone, 2012) . Similarly, another Japanese study conducted on 303 internal medical patients reported that 27.7 per cent involved in doctor shopping (Sansome & Sansone, 2012) . Also, a study in Hong Kong indicated that 40 per cent participated in doctor shopping because of doctor’s transfers and lack of professional referral in the illness period (Meyer et al., 2014) . Also, a study on family-medicine patients established that 56 per cent acknowledged doctor shopping.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Additionally, according to the emergency department, prescription of opioids increased by 146% in the period between 2005-2011 and the data was verified by the Drug Abuse Warning Network. Also, the admirations of opioids such as methadone and heroin increased tenfold from 3% to 30% in the period between 2003 to 2013 as provided by Treatment Episode Data Sets (TEDS) (Simeone, 2017) . Similarly, a report by CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention) indicated a 5fold increase in usage of opioids from the period 1999 to 2014 (Simeone, 2017) .
Data Collection
The data collection involved the use of empirical studies in examining patients on doctor shopping. In Norwegian research, a study was held to determine the association between the doctors consulted and the instruction for addictive drugs. The study grouped the sample into two those who sought five or more physicians on addictive drugs and those who sought for non-addictive drugs. Empirical studies from Hong Kong found a relationship between doctor shopping with benzodiazepine abuse. Also, a survey to examine the number of overdose fatalities found that 21.4 per cent had a history of doctor shopping (Sansome & Sansone, 2012) . Additionally, data collection from IMS to measure doctor shopping on more than 11 billion prescription records was established to measure the prevalence of doctor shopping (Simeone, 2017) .
I used two Boolean strings in my search, opioids AND addiction and drug shopping AND epidemic. My sources ranged from 2012-2017 and focused on the most current known on drug shopping. Research modalities such as calling via telephone and sending emails in private as a follow up for the opioids addicts was used.
Study Subjects
The study subjects involved in the studies majorly consisted of outpatient. Also in patients were surveyed in their previous exposure to doctor shopping. Another target group was heroin drug addicts. Also, random sampling questionnaires were also applied to random people. (Sansome & Sansone, 2012) .
Assumptions
I assume that doctors shopping is a way of seeking better treatments due to patient-related factors and physician-related factors. Patient-related factors such as persistence in chronic illnesses can make patient seek medical attention from multiple doctors. Also, due to physician-related factors, such as stern physicians is a factor for doctor shopping (Volkow & McLellan, 2016) . Similarly, inconvenient office location, inconvenient hours, insufficient time for patient-physician interaction, and undesirable physician qualities is a factor contributing to doctor shopping. Patients seek health facilities where they are heard and respected.
Limitations
Doctor shopping is quite a complex phenomenon. The rationale for doctor shopping matters the most. The failure to understand the reason for doctor shopping has contributed to a controversy whether doctor shopping is supposed to be legalised or not. Additionally, studies are only descriptive on the number of patients who opt for doctor shopping without including the rationale for doctor shopping. Also, the large sample size of prescription records may provide exaggerated outcomes. Consequently, examining the inpatients on the number of doctor shopping they have experience in their lifetime is prone to error because of face to face interviews unreliable data collection tool (Griggs, Weiner & Fieldman, 2015) . Finally, doctor shopping is inclusive of a wide patient’s behaviour which goes beyond acquiring illicit prescription medications.
Plan Implementation
Regulating doctor shopping require a physician to monitor prescribed drugs by establishing a nationwide database for keeping health prescription which accessible by various health facilities. Administration of addictive narcotics such as heroin and opioids should be controlled by the facility administration and physician involved should face the law. Additionally, alternative non-additive homoeopathic medicines should be put in place to limit the use of opioids (Perez et al., 2017) . These homoeopathic medicines are extracted from the natural setting and have low harmful properties.
Addicts coaching and education is vital to illustrate the lethal effects on an overdose of addictive drugs, the importance of treatment consistency in achieving minimum inhibitory concentration on a drug to avoid recurrent illnesses. Preventive medications drug addiction such as naltrexone can be administered to block brain receptors related to cravings and to complement behavioural therapy. Also applying the 12 step recovery program which involves making amends on drugs behaviour (Perez et al., 2017) . For instance, the opiate-addicted person might be guided to amend from addiction except if it would cause harm to them.
The shortcomings of using methadone are that the addicts can continue using opioids while which methadone making it harder for addicted to recover. Other side effects are weight gain, constipation, and sexual dysfunction. Additionally, Suboxone is accompanied by clinical side effects such as dizziness, headaches, nausea, depression, drowsiness and decreased sex drives (Perez et al., 2017) . However, suboxone is currently the most recommended therapy for addiction treatment.
Better alternatives such as CBD, glucosamine, frankincense, and turmeric for inflammation reduce cravings, repair brain damage, cause improved sleep, and alleviate any form of anxiety which offers significant help in treating addiction. The gaging of therapeutic success can be seen when there are reduced annual prescription rates (Vosburg et al., 2016) . Also, reduced prescription rates from government databases can be compared to health facility databases to establish whether the drugs are properly prescribed.
Consequently, increasing communication through positive self-talk, assertiveness, reading social cues, give and take, and empathy provide a better tool in drug recovery. Additionally, increasing government incentives and reimbursement for meeting in drug control sectors will provide an important approach to lowering opioids usage (Hser et al., 2015) . Failure can be assessed when there is a high level of opiate use, reluctant laws regarding addictive drug control and poor database records on the state drugs circulation.
Reference
Griggs, C. A., Weiner, S. G., & Feldman, J. A. (2015). The Prescription drug monitoring programs: examining limitations and future approaches. Western Journal of Emergency Medicine , 16 (1), 67.
Hser, Y. I., Evans, E., Grella, C., Ling, W., & Anglin, D. (2015). Long-term course of opioid addiction. Harvard review of psychiatry , 23 (2), 76-89.
Meyer, R., Patel, A. M., Rattana, S. K., Quock, T. P., & Mody, S. H. (2014). Prescription opioid abuse: a literature review of the clinical and economic burden in the United States. Population health management , 17 (6), 372-387.
Perez, N. M., Jennings, W. G., Wang, Y., & Delcher, C. (2017). The Law Enforcement Officers’, The Perceptions of Florida’s Prescription in Drug Monitoring Program. The Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice , 33 (4), 368-379.
Sansone, R. A., & Sansone, L. A. (2012). Doctor shopping: the phenomenon of many themes. Innovations in clinical neuroscience , 9 (11-12), 42.
Simeone, R. (2017). Doctor shopping behaviour and the diversion of prescription opioids. Substance abuse: research and treatment , 11 , 1178221817696077.
Volkow, N. D., & McLellan, A. T. (2016). Opioid abuse in chronic pain—misconceptions and mitigation strategies. New England Journal of Medicine , 374 (13), 1253-1263.
Vosburg, S. K., Eaton, T. A., Sokolowski, M., Osgood, E. D., Ashworth, J. B., Trudeau, J. J., ... & Katz, N. P. (2016). Prescription opioid abuse, prescription opioid addiction, and heroin abuse among adolescents in a recovery high school: a pilot study. Journal of Child & Adolescent Substance Abuse , 25 (2), 105-112.
