Pharmacist Discusses Drug Abuse in HBO Documentary

A Massachusetts pharmacist is speaking out about prescription drug abuse and heroin addiction in a new HBO documentary available later this month.

Lauren Heroux-Camirand, RPh, conducted 2 interviews with the filmmakers of Heroin: Cape Cod USA at Country Square Pharmacy in Attleboro, Massachusetts, according to The Sun Chronicle.

The pharmacist told the paper that she thought it was important to talk openly about illicit drug use.

“We are here, as pharmacists and humans, to be compassionate and help in any way we can,” she told The Sun Chronicle. “That is why I agreed to participate and speak up.”

In her interviews with the filmmakers, Heroux-Camirand discussed both facts about drug abuse and her experiences seeing people struggle with addiction, The Sun Chronicle reported.

For example, she talked about a particular patient who had often been asking for early refills of painkillers. She tried to tell him that he was taking the pills too quickly, but he died the next day.

In another instance, she had a patient who was prescribed a dangerous combination of 3 narcotics. The prescriber dismissed her when she called him about the issue, so she refused to fill the prescription.

Heroux-Camirand is also an advocate for pharmacists’ abilities to dispense naloxone.

She tried contacting several physicians for a standing order to provide the overdose antidote, but she never heard back. It wasn’t until one of her customers died that she was able to obtain a standing order.

“It took a year and for someone to die,” Heroux-Camirand told The Sun Chronicle.

The movie will premiere in Massachusetts before debuting on HBO on December 28, 2015.