Medications through the Internet: what clinicians and patients need to know

Patients are now able to obtain mail order prescriptions through the Internet from reputable online pharmacies without leaving their home. While this can be a great convenience, the Internet also provides a new means for easily questionable or even illegal prescription medications, i.e., prescription legend medications may be obtained without a prescription and drug products not legally available in the United States can be obtained in this way. Many chronic pain patients are drug seeking, and increasingly many are using the Internet to learn about medications, and perhaps to obtain them. Clinicians should know where their patients obtain medications, how to verify the validity of the sources of prescriptions, and how to report fraud. Ways to verify the legitimacy of an online pharmacy are described.