Keeping an x-ray, ECG, EEG or similar could be difficult; since last November, medical records no longer get passed by paper - they're all on computer and accessible to EVERY doc in the country at the click of a moose. That also more or less ends doctor shopping here. Thanks for the replies which have given me a bit to think about. I asked because I need some for doctors in another couple of European countries. Just in case they doubt my need for the strong opiates. I'm actually hoping for a change of scenery from oxycodone, which I have grown very tolerant to. 20mg oxy = 7.5mg hydromorphone = 3 x 2.6mg capsules Palladone four times daily. I think Palladone (hydromorphone, Palladone available in USA but only instants - Palladone SR was banned, for what reason I don't know, it's a 12 hourly drug like OxyContin; has anybody used Janssen's 24 hour hydromorphone? Can it be crushed to make it instant? And what strengths does it come in?
As you can see, my medical records may be an aid to prescription abroad of analgesics and anxiolytics/hypnotics which I need and have used for many years, the idea being to get a 90 day supply of everything, and many new and lesser used benzos like flutoprazepam (don't understand the nomenclature 'flu-to', will have to ask a chemist or a certain guy who posts on Rx forums but not here unless he's using an alias) but on my way to Serbia, second last stop on my journey, I pass through Italy and Slovenija where it is sold as 'Restas'. Sounds like a hypnotic but it's definitely a strong anxiolytic. Delorazepam, a much stronger version of its parent, is also available there. Got to get a supply of cloxazolam and clotiazepam, Akton and Clozan respectively, 2mg Rohypnol and 12mg Lexotan (bromazepam) too. And of course in Belgium the very strong branded benzos that most countries no longer prescribe - the 50mg Seresta Forte oxazepam, like the Serenid-D Forte my father prescribed so much and so often. I think that my records would show that, far from the lowest dose possible favoured by British benzophobic doctors, I would benefit from this, along with the very fast-acting 2mg Xanax which my income stops me using, because the strongest Xanax available here is 500mcg, Upjohn '55's, at a price higher than any other European country and needing 84 tablets a week at a cost of over £35, a third of my total income for a week. Somebody please let me know the price of those (the 500mg Xanax brand) in the USA; there IS one generic alp made here but 99% of scripts are dispensed as brand Xanax. I have only ever been given that once - it's dreadful by the way - and it's always been a source of wonder to me why the most useful, effective and popular benzo in the world is actively discouraged here and priced beyond the reach of the patient whose anxiolytic of choice is probably the best for panic attacks with GAD, Xanax.
I have mentioned before that trips to other EU countries are most probably the best idea in a country with a failing National Health Service with less choice for the patient than even small countries like Slovenija, and far less than Belgium, Germany and Hungary.
They won't have a clue what I've been doing until well after I return home, fancy new national computer or not, by which time they won't be able to do anything about it, everything having been properly prescribed and dispensed with the financial aid of my EHIC. Why spend a fortune on a national medial rcords computer system when it could have been spent on patient services, or funding cancer drugs deemed too expensive to prescribe nationally? Many lives could be saved or prolonged by the group of meds in question, whose name escapes me, but which are not to be made available.
Urgent surgery is now almost as popular a reason for travel from the UK to Hungary as tourism due to very long waiting lists for some types of operation, some of which are serious.
The computerisation of records clearly is a bit of a white elephant.
Don't forget, let us know the pricing of 0.5mg Xanax in the US. And how much cheaper are an excellent generic like Greenstone and a truly awful quality one like Sandoz (GG246, 247,248,249) which some people actually think is representative of the normal potency of alprazolam.
Cheers and thanks for the answers. I have been out of touch for a short while due to Police custody and hospital stay so have not been able to keep up with things. I'll now probably find so much to comment on I'll be logged on for a week. And I am dreading the email. It only takes a week to ten days to create a backlog of gargantuan proportion, impossible to answer unless I spend days on it.
Thanks again folks.
Abs