Senate Bill No. 534
(By Senators Kessler, Barnes, Laird, Browning, Minard and Chafin)
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[Introduced February 10, 2010; referred to the Committee on
Health and Human Resources; and then to the Committee on the
Judiciary.]
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A BILL to amend the Code of West Virginia, 1931, as amended, by
adding thereto a new section, designated §60A-4-410a,
relating to mandating practitioners to report suspected
prescription fraud involving controlled substances to law-
enforcement agencies; penalty; and immunity.
Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That the Code of West Virginia, 1931, as amended, be amended
by adding thereto a new section, designated §60A-4-410a, to read
as follows:
ARTICLE 4. OFFENSES AND PENALTIES.
§60A-4-410a. Practitioners mandated to report prescription fraud
to law-enforcement agencies; penalty; immunity.
(a) Any practitioner, who has reasonable cause to suspect
that a patient has used misrepresentation, fraud, forgery, deception or
subterfuge to acquire or obtain a prescription for a controlled
substance or has withheld information from a practitioner that
the patient has obtained a prescription for a controlled
substance of
a similar therapeutic use in a concurrent time period from
another
practitioner, shall report said patient to the State Police or
any
1aw-enforcement agency having jurisdiction to investigate the
complaint.
(b) Any practitioner who violates this section is guilty of
a misdemeanor and, upon conviction thereof, may be fined not more
than one thousand dollars.
(c) Any practitioner participating in good faith in any act
permitted or required by this section shall be immune from any
civil or criminal liability, or any professional disciplinary
action taken against the practitioner that otherwise might result
by reason of such action.
NOTE: The purpose of this bill is to mandate that
practitioners
report suspected prescription fraud involving
controlled substances to law-enforcement agencies.
This section is new; therefore, strike-throughs and
underscoring have been omitted.