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From The Gleaner:

Prescription drug abuse may make a good story — but it's a killer, according to Kentucky Attorney General Jack Conway.

He should know. When the hit cable TV show "Justified" was in development he sat down with the writers and helped steer them in the right direction.

He was running for U.S. Senate at the time and raising money in Santa Monica, Calif., where he met Sarah Timberman, one of the executive producers of the FX series "Justified," the third season of which is currently winding down. Their conversation went something like this, according to Conway, who visited the Tri-county area Monday to talk about prescription drug abuse.

"Naturally you're talking a lot about the prescription pill epidemic, right?" he asked.

"What are you talking about?" Timberman replied. "We thought the big drug problem would have been heroin."

"No it's prescription pills. You've got people who have hijacked FedEx trucks and everything in eastern Kentucky. We've got pharmacists in eastern Kentucky who are behind bullet-proof glass."

That got her attention, and she asked him to allow her writers to pick his brains, which is how he wound up in "this huge conference room with a dozen people. I sat there for 45 minutes to an hour and answered questions about crime in eastern Kentucky. About what it looks like to go into a deep mine. About the prescription pill epidemic. They were taking copious notes. I gave them a total primer on crime in eastern Kentucky. And then this show comes on and it's a huge hit."

While it may make an entertaining story, the drugs are no joke, which is what he told students at Union County High School on Monday, in the company with two parents who have lost children to drugs.

"Not a lot of people know that we're going to lose more people to prescription drug overdoses this year than we lose from traffic accidents," Conway said. "It happened last year. The data is starting to tell us that one in five kids is using prescription pills for an off-label purpose. We saw the number of overdose deaths going up. Young people think that because a doctor prescribed it and there's a label on it, it won't hurt you.

"We lose over 1,000 people a year to prescription pill overdoses. That's more than we lose on our highways. And we think that's under-reported" because only about half of accidental deaths get entered into the state medical examiner's system.

Xanax, hydrocodone and oxycodone cause more deaths than alcohol, heroin or cocaine, he said. "Those are the three leading things found in the bloodstream of those reported deaths." Oxycontin, a time-released form of oxycodone, is particularly dangerous, he said, because when it is crushed it releases all of the drug at once. And some people's bodies can't handle it.

Part of the problem, he said, is that the state tool for tracking drugs is ineffective. KASPER, which stands for Kentucky All-Schedule Prescription Electronic Reporting, would be moved from the Cabinet for Health and Family Services to the attorney general's office if House Bill 4 passes, but it's being fought by the medical community, he said.

Other major provisions of the bill would require doctors to participate (only about 25 percent currently do), stop pain management clinics from dispensing drugs, and require that such clinics be owned by physicians or health care facilities. It would also limit mail order sales. "You don't need to be shipping a 90-day supply of oxycontin or hydrocodone when about half of it typically ends up on the street," he said.

KASPER also needs to have the ability to communicate with similar systems in other states, he said. That's particularly important in border towns such as Henderson, where "you need to know what's going on in Illinois and Indiana. Because it's very easy to ride over and get the pills elsewhere."

Henderson County residents who accompanied Conway to his Morganfield appearance included science teacher Ashley Bailey and students Laura Kirk, Dallas Dohrn, Riley Thompson and Amanda Keown, who are part of a program at Henderson County High School to combat substance abuse. "I made them a promise to come do one of those events in Henderson."

Go to The Gleaner of Hendersonville, KY.

I had it placed more than three years ago following the birth of my son. A year into it, I began having health problems; my hair started falling out, acne plagued my skin, I experienced occasional urinary tract infections and my stomach swelled.

While I immediately recognized a few of these afflictions as possible side effects of the IUD, hair loss wasn't listed as a side effect in the literature given to me by my doctor. Although it’s now included on Mirena’s Web site, one must search for the information. With no answers as to what was going on at the time, I felt something was terribly wrong with me.

Depression inevitably followed. 

While even the elderly men on both sides of my family sport healthy heads of hair, mine was now coming out in clumps and a bald spot was developing front-and-center.

I’m 30 years old.  

Upon scouring the Internet, I began to see a common theme: Women losing hair following a Mirena insertion. I knew it was time to get the thing removed, despite a previous assurance from my doctor that Mirena wasn't the cause of my hair loss. 

Attempting to schedule an appointment with my doctor's office, which is inconveniently located several miles from my house, but is the closest gynecologist to me covered by my insurance, I was told I would have to wait three weeks to be seen.

So I called my local Planned Parenthood office and my IUD was out the following morning. 

I was not asked to pay a dime, and following a survey inquiring about the quality of my visit, I was sent home with a bag of condoms and plenty of information on other birth control options, including a hormone-free IUD. 

That was less than a week ago. My hair has stopped falling out, though it may take a year to grow back and regain its healthy sheen. My acne is calming down and even my stomach has already flattened. I’m not a scientist and can’t be 100 percent sure all that these maladies were caused by my birth control, but I feel free.

Because, what is freedom without informed choices?

When pharmaceutical companies or even the government deprive a woman of information, she is robbed of the opportunity to make the decision that’s right for her.

We don’t need the government marching into our doctor’s office — as so many conservatives are all too quick to point out until it comes to a woman’s uterus — we need them protecting us from harmful pharmaceuticals, a task given to the Food and Drug Administration.

Citizens can report a possibly dangerous drug or device to the FDA by visting the agency's Web site, as I did regarding my side effects caused by Mirena.

Perhaps something will come of it but in the meantime, I am once again grateful to Planned Parenthood. It remains a truly unique and invaluable resource at a time when religious views are affecting policies regarding birth control. Access to contraception isn't a question of women’s rights to be evaluated by a panel of old men and virgins. It's a health issue....

Read the complete article here.