Died in September 2021 of a overdose from medications, Melyne was only 18 years old. Less than a year later, her mother Sandrine and her sister Léa are fighting with the help of a petition which has more than 50,000 signatures. This wants to alert on the dangerousness of certain pharmacies which deliver anxiolytics too easily to young people.
In fact, Melyne obtained methadone and Xanax using fake prescriptions. Student in photography school and when she was not yet of age, she used her knowledge to “fag prescriptions on her computer”, says her sister Léa. Her mother recalls: “She made videos in the pharmacy to show how simple it was. Melyne said she had lost her Carte Vitale, and she was paying in cash. »
The difficulty of identifying “medical nomads”
If these anxiolytics are issued only on prescription, the Vitale card is not compulsory. However, Hugues Videlier, president of the order of pharmacists of Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, specifies: “We always ask for Vitales cards because it is a facility for us. If this card allows the advance of costs, it also allows access to patient records.
Hugues Videlier recognizes that it is very complicated to monitor patients who practice “medical nomadism”, consisting of consulting several practitioners for the same pathology in order to be issued several prescriptions. Some can do “up to 30 different doctors, and as many pharmacies”, he specifies. For pharmacists, it therefore becomes difficult to differentiate “real” patients from people in a state of addiction, who are sometimes coming for the first time.
Secure messaging, a solution?
To fight against these false prescriptions, Hugues Videlier and his colleagues ask for infallible messaging: “For years, we have been asking for secure prescriptions. Physicians should be equipped with secure messaging directly linked to the pharmacy. We’re not going to get out of this as long as we keep printing prescriptions. »
From now on, for Sandrine and Léa, the fight continues. If they implore the vigilance of the pharmacists, the two women alert the parents at the same time: “I also made this petition so that the parents can realize that the family pharmacy is a danger” explains Melyne’s mother. Cough syrup, antidepressants or other drugs can indeed become real explosive and deadly cocktails.