A Deer Park doctor has delivered a federal complaint accusing Osco Drug of persistently sending faxes urging him to refill patients’ prescriptions, including those for opioids.
Dr. Jay Joshi and National Pain Centers, LLC, of Vernon Hills, filed a complaint May 16 in Chicago against American Drug Stores Inc., which operates retail pharmacy Osco, saying the company violated the federal Telephone Consumer Protection Act with unwanted faxes starting as far back as August 2011.
According to the complaint, the messages — 20 or more in a single day, once as many as 109 — were intended to solicit National Pain Centers and its doctors to write new prescriptions as a means of driving Osco’s business. Joshi said the faxes addressed prescriptions not originally written to allow patients to obtain refills.
“The prescriptions were written in this manner for good reason,” the complaint stated, “as many of them were written for controlled substances, including but not limited to dangerous opioid pain medications.”
The complaint included an example of one of the faxes in question. Dated May 12, 2017, the document lists Joshi as the prescribing physician with blank spaces for a patient’s name and date of birth. It references a prior prescription, dated March 2, 2017, with zero refills remaining, for 90 25-miligram Lyrica capsules. The fax is listed as coming from Osco store 3476 on East Euclid Avenue in Mount Prospect, and invites Joshi to fill out the form and fax back, to call the pharmacy to give verbal authorization or, if certified, to send a new electronic prescription.
Joshi said neither he nor the practice voluntarily gave the number for their fax line to Osco “within the context of an ‘established business relationship,’ ” nor did Osco obtain “prior express consent” of receipt of such messages.
They said the faxes constitute invasion of privacy and a waste of employee time while increasing overhead costs, “intrusion upon and occupation of the capacity” of phone lines and reducing revenue by discouraging patients’ follow-up visits. Joshi said the ability monitor patients, by having them come in for appointments rather than automatically renewing a prescription, “is the fundamental purpose of a medical practice.”
Formal allegations include negligent violations of the TCPA, which carry statutory penalties of $500 per infraction, as well as knowing and or willful TCPA violations, for which statutory violations are $1,500 per occurrence. It also includes one count of tortious interference with a business relationship or expectancy, specifically alleging the faxes were intentionally sent to increase Osco profits and would have reduced patients’ satisfaction with National Pain Centers “due to confusion caused by the unsolicited refill requests.”
A similar count is an allegation of tortious interference with a contractual relationship, a complaint linked to a reduction in patients’ office visits.
In addition to requesting a jury trial and statutory damages, the complaint seeks an injunction prohibiting Osco from sending such faxes going forward.
Representing Joshi and National Pain Centers in the matter is attorney David B. Levin, of the Law Offices of Todd M. Friedman P.C., of Northbrook.