Waldonian

I'm currently an RN (ASN) student in Florida & I take adderall for ADD. I have received a lot of conflicting information about whether it's a violation of the FL Nurse Practice Act for an RN to take (prescribed) stimulant medications. Anyone have any insights on this?

I'm on the alternate list My friend had a score 1 higher than mine and got called on Friday. I'm keeping my fingers crossed and my phone on.

A fellow pre-RN student and friend of mine is struggling with addiction to hydrocodone (prescribed for back pain). Her physical therapy sessions have gotten her to the point where she no longer needs the meds for pain, but when she goes a day without taking them she starts to withdraw. She feels she can't deal with the withdraw symptoms while going to school full time and working, so she's continued to ask the doctor for refills. She wants to discuss this with her doctor, and try suboxone or another form of gradual withdraw but is afraid to because of the questions about addiction treatment on the application for RN licensure in Florida. The two questions which worry her are: 6a "...have you been enrolled in, required to enter into, or participated in any drug or alcohol recovery program...within the past five years? 6f "During the last five years, have you been treated for or had a recurrence of a diagnosed substance-related (alcohol/drug) disorder that has impaired your ability to practice nursing" She certainly doesn't want to start nursing school addicted to narcotics, but she is afraid of either falling behind in school while she suffers through the withdraw symptoms unaided or having her eligibility for licensure affected by a diagnosis of addiction. She has no criminal history with drugs, though she did get a DUI about ten years ago. What I want to find out for her is: 1. Could answering yes to either of these questions potentially disqualify her, require her to be in some sort of monitoring program as a condition of licensure, or cause her any other problems? 2. Would using suboxone or some sort of doctor supervised tapering off of dosage be considered a "recovery program" in question 6a? 3. Does 6f even pertain to her, it hasn't "impaired her ability to practice nursing" in the sense that she is not yet a nurse, and her addiction hasn't yet impaired her ability to work in general?