am i understanding this correctly?

Nurses Recovery

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ok, so nurse A takes vicodin for chronic back pain, xanax for anxiety, prozac for depression, and ambien to sleep. she is not "impaired" at work, has been on them for years, has a rx for all of them, never ever diverted. am i understanding correctly from reading some of the posts here that this nurses needs to be reported to the bon and in a recovery program? just for taking the meds prescribed to her? :confused:

Specializes in CRNA, Finally retired.

A nurse on Xanax and Vicodin alone is probably too sick to be working as a nurse. You don't mention if she's under the influence at work or uses them only when not working. Vicodin is a really bad drug and not very effective for back pain. Xanax probably should only be an occasional thing if her anxiety were well controlled with non-addicting anti-anxiety drugs. Sleep would be better also. Sounds like a lot of rationalization to me.

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Specializes in Oncology and Hospice/Palliative Care.

You don't need to do any reporting. In Texas, nurses who have had psychiatric issues - even YEARS ago - have been yanked by the BNE and forced to participate in TPAPN. I'm not bitter... :nuke:

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