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WV pharmacies not waiting around for board’s discipline of doctor

Citing “a preponderance of evidence,” a West Virginia pharmacy is refusing to fill prescriptions for a doctor who has yet to be found guilty of wrongdoing by the state medical board.

Dr. Iraj Derakhshan has been a prolific prescriber of Schedule II prescription drugs the past several years. According to a June 14 report in the Charleston Daily Mail, Derakhshan doled out over 14,000 prescriptions for controlled substances in a six-moth period, was a top prescriber of oxycodone, and raised the dosage of his patients’ pain medication at an alarmingly high rate. Derakhshan remains confident he will be vindicated, according to the report.

Due to the staggering numbers of prescriptions written by Derakhshan in such a short amount of time, Drug Emporium – a pharmacy services company which has two locations in Charleston, West Virginia – has decided to reject Derakhshan’s prescriptions in the future.

Jerry Leonard, vice president of Drug Emporium stated in the Daily Mail report that the preemptive decision was made for the sake of the company’s pharmacists and pharmacies.

However, cutting off some patients abruptly is a concern, according to Leonard, so the company decided to allow one more month of prescriptions for Derakhshan’s patients if the attending pharmacist feels that doing so is an appropriate course of action.

Now other pharmacies around the state are following Drug Emporium’s lead.  The medical board’s decision is expected by the end of July.

Read more here.