Medication and DOT

I already know the rules. I am only offering comment concerning what I have seen and also heard of the drivers doing.

 

Roadmedic - sorry, looking back on it my post didn't come out the way I wanted it to. I've read enough of your posts to know you have a fair handle on things. And now I can't seem to find the train of thought I was taking ..

Krispb - that's handy. I had to deal with a lot of back and forth because of my sleep apnea, and my primary ( a clinic ) would take forever to respond. Even WITH me calling daily. Can't afford t change, either - that clinic is the only place in 15 miles that takes my insurance

 

Let's get back to the beginning... Question was, does the dot verify what you're taking...? Not an expert here, but would well imagine that if pill bottles were in plain sight, they would no doubt look to see if the driver's name was on them. Additionally, they would naturally check to see that said driver had a current dot/med card on him/her, and if they had common sense, that the names on the bottle and the card matched. If the names didn't match, I'd imagine they'd have some questions for the driver, especially if the med in question was known to have undesirable effects on said driver. Outside of that, the dot isn't necessarily in the business of medicinal appropriateness . I think that's really the long and short of it.

 

Depends on the drugs. State officers many times do not but a federal officer might.

You are required to show all drugs on the long form physical when you complete your portion. If caught, failure to report medications can be considered a falsification or deception of records and the driver would in all likelyhood be disqualified for a period of time depending on the drugs.

Certain drugs are an automatic out-of-service assuming a state officer knows the rules. If you take a prescription for any type codene for instance it is a legal drug. However the rules require any driver that is taking a prescription with codene (including but not limited to hydrocodene) may not drive while on that prescription. Vicotin is of this type drug.

Further. let's say you received a prescription for codene last fall when you were raking leaves and pulled a muscle in your back. You didn't use all of them & merely put them away. Now 3-weeks ago you fell off a ladder painting your home. You start taking what's left of the codene. Even though it is a legal prescription it has now become an illegal drug because you are not taking it for the original intended purpose.

From the old retired federal DOT officer.

 

quote=psanderson;613392]Depends on the drugs. State officers many times do not but a federal officer might.

You are required to show all drugs on the long form physical when you complete your portion. If caught, failure to report medications can be considered a falsification of records and the driver would in all likelyhood be disqualified for a period of time depending on the drugs.

Certain drugs are an automatic out-of-service assuming a state officer knows the rules. If you take a prescription for any type codene for instance it is a legal drug. However the rules require any driver that is taking a prescription with codene (including hydrocodene) may not drive while on that prescription. Vicotin is of this type drug.

Further. let's say you received a prescription for codene last fall when you were raking leaves and pulled a muscle in your back. You didn't use all of them & merely put them away. Now 3-weeks ago you fell off a ladder painting your home. You start taking what's left of the codene. Even though it is a legal prescription it has now become an illegal drug because you are not taking it for the original intended purpose.

From the old retired federal DOT officer.[/quote]

Everything you said is correct to my knowledge. But I think this is a good example of the question being more important than the answer. It just kinda begged some type of scenario as a back story, and I tried to set a couple up. All of your points are well taken. Just as an aside, I was prescribed vicodin for pain by my primary physician, the same one who did my DOT physical just months prior. He had full knowledge I drove a transit bus and prescribed the vicodin anyway. I have to say I did drive while under the influence of the meds for a while until I healed. I had only a passing thought as to what the law was regarding this. Looking back, I think it would have been my butt if I had been involved in an accident. But I also wonder about my doctor's actions, especially not even mentioning anything about driving the bus. I would like opinion on this.[

 

I think I should have said,. "Whoa, what about driving?!" when the doc prescribed Vicodin. And I also wonder if this would have been a situation where my temporary disability insurance would have covered any additional time I would have been unable to work due to having to take the medicine. You know, how can the doctor clear me to go back to work driving a bus when he prescribes medicine that would make driving illegal?

 

Most doctors don't know the full extent of 49CFR parts 40, 382, and 391. And you are correct. If you were to have been in an incident/accident you would have been held legally responsible for not asking the question "Do the rules allow me to drive a commercial vehicle while on this medication"?

 

psanderson.. thank you..

Now I have a true-to-life question for you.

I have the occasional kidney stone. In the event of an.. event, my doctor has prescribed Oxycodone - which tends to make me just a tad loopy. Certainly unfit for driving.

In the past, knowing it's a bad thing for driving, I've left it at home (not had any problems in about 2 years - but it had been about 15 since the previous stone).

How would DOT view such a prescription? It would still be used for the original purpose, after all - but it's not a daily thing. (and no way would I be driving if I took the stuff. Heck, I'm not sure I could even turn the key to start the truck)

 

LURCH: No, that is still intended for its' correct (original) purpose. But also remember that as a synthetic codene it will diminish in intensity after about a year, or so I've been told by the same doctor with whom I spoke on that other problem from this site. And you are correct when you don't take it with you however it can remain in your system for about 40-hours so you better stop that much before driving lest you get hooked for a random, or some other kind of selection.

And I know how bad those darn things can be. I just got out of the hospital about 3-months ago with them. My urologist always gives me Demarol (another synthetic opiate) which is stronger than the synthetic opiate oxycodone.