Opinion ID: 1873411
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: The KASPER System and the 2007 Amendment Regarding Civil Actions

Text: In 1998, the General Assembly enacted House Bill 115, which, in pertinent part, established what has come to be known as the KASPER system, an electronic system for monitoring Schedules II, III, IV, and V controlled substances dispensed within the Commonwealth. The Bill's KASPER provisions have been codified at KRS 218A.202, and under that statute for each of the listed controlled substances dispensed, licensed medical practitioners and pharmacists are required to report to the Cabinet for Health and Family Services (Cabinet) the patient, the drug, the date of dispensing, the quantity, the prescriber, and the dispenser. The computerized database compiled from this information enables the Cabinet to identify persons prescribing, dispensing, or receiving what appear to be unusually large amounts of the controlled substances. The statute then further authorizes the Cabinet to provide that information in certain circumstances to licensing authorities, to practitioners, to peace officers, to grand juries, and to courts. [1] As originally enacted in 1998, the statute made clear that the KASPER data was to remain confidential. The Bill provided expressly that [t]he data and any report obtained therefrom shall not be a public record, KRS 218A.202(8) (1998), and further deemed the knowing disclosure of data to unauthorized persons a class D felony. The original Bill did not, however, purport to remove KASPER data or records from the discovery provisions of either the civil or the criminal rules. In 2007, the General Assembly amended KRS 218A.202. In pertinent part, Senate Bill 88 purported to prohibit disclosure of KASPER data to any unauthorized person or entity, including disclosure in the context of a civil action where the disclosure is sought either for the purpose of discovery or for evidence. KRS 218A.202(6) (2007). This amendment, passed nine years after the adoption of the KASPER system, is the focus of the writ action before this Court.