New Jersey Opioid Over-Prescription Lawyers

FIGHTING FOR NEW JERSEY OPIOD OVER-PRESCRIPTION VICTIMS

For fifteen years Richard Hollawell has been unrelenting in holding doctors responsible for improperly prescribing painkillers and other medicines to their patients causing addiction and death. Mr. Hollawell does not just go after irresponsible doctors. He has also fought against and held pharmaceutical companies responsible for fraudulent marketing and their flooding of painkillers into our communities.

 We are in the midst of an epidemic with rates of deaths and overdoses from prescription medication at unprecedented levels. Mr. Hollawell has a highly regarded reputation throughout the United States for aggressively taking on and taking down unethical doctors and unethical pharmaceutical companies.

Contact our opioid overdose lawyers today at 1-800-681-3550 or using the form below for a free consultation.

What is Opioid Overprescription and Do I Have a Case?

More and more, we’ve been seeing pharmaceutical companies and doctors finally facing consequences for decades of over-prescribing highly addictive opioids. The legal forms of opioids, such as oxycodone, hydrocodone, codeine, and morphine, are intended to treat severe pain. They are usually prescribed after a surgery or injury, and in quantities that are in excess of the recommended amount or what would be considered necessary after a specific surgery or injury. The addictive nature of prescription opioids and the difficulty of acquiring more once the bottle runs out has led to the country’s widespread heroin epidemic, as heroin is far easier and cheaper to obtain than prescription pills.

Opioid misuse happens when patients take the medicine in a different dose than prescribed or through a different method (such as nasally in powder form or intravenously after dissolving the pills in water), when people take someone else’s prescription, or when they’re taken to get high rather than to treat pain.

If you or a loved one have undergone surgery or treatment for an injury and were prescribed an opioid painkiller and have suffered health problems or death from an overdose, the medical provider could be held legally responsible if it is determined that they knowingly over-prescribed the painkillers. We’re here to help you build your case and ensure that you receive justice.

The over-prescription of opioid painkillers that leads to health problems or death can be considered medical malpractice or negligence. In these instances, your doctor will have deviated from the accepted professional standard of care. It’s important to understand what you’ll need to prove in order to successfully bring an opioid over-prescription case against your medical provider.

What Do I Need to Prove an Opioid Over-prescription Case in New Jersey?

The statute of limitations for bringing a medical malpractice case in New Jersey is two years from the date that the malpractice occurred. However, with opioid addiction, health issues, and death, the effects can take longer than that to occur or become noticeable. Luckily, New Jersey has provisions for this exception, allowing the statute of limitations to apply from when the patients would have reasonably become aware of the health issues caused by the doctor’s actions.

These actions can include:

• Prescribing the wrong dosage
• Prescribing too many pills (the most common occurrence)  
• Prescribing the wrong opioid for the patient’s condition
• Prescribing opioids to patients with conditions that are not always safe to take opioid painkillers with

A number of factors can be considered when building an opioid over-prescription case, including:

• Whether the doctor adequately looked into the patient’s medical history for any conditions that may prove risky to take an opioid painkiller or for any history of substance abuse or addiction
• If the prescription was medically necessary for the patient
• If refills were provided without actually seeing the patient
• If the patient was warned about the risks of opioid painkillers
• Whether the doctor was receiving kickbacks for prescribing certain opioids or if they have a history of writing an excessive number of prescriptions for opioids to patients

For a comprehensive look at what the process for medical malpractice cases in New Jersey looks like, you can view our medical malpractice page.

What Should I Do If I Think I Have an Opioid Overprescription Case?

The biggest catalyst in the legal cases against doctors and pharmaceutical companies has been the discovery that many pharmaceutical companies are essentially bribing doctors with money and other benefits to prescribe their drug. This has led to doctors doling out opioid prescriptions like candy for financial gain, while the people who trusted their doctors to take care of them are suffering. Richard Hollawell has 10 years of experience in opioid over-prescription cases, knows how to take on reckless doctors and drug makers, and can get you the compensation that you deserve.

If you think your doctor has been over-prescribing opioid painkillers to you or a loved one and you’ve suffered from lasting health problems, addiction, or an overdose death as a result, please contact us at (800) 681-3550 so we can start building your case.