In the most flagrant abuse, patients line up outside of Medicaid mills where unscrupulous doctors dispense unneeded prescriptions.

Under this program, only registered doctors and pharmacists can prescribe and dispense lenalidomide.

But those are medical judgments, some would say, and only doctors should dispense them.

At Confimed, the doctor and drugstore are rolled into one; Washington, like some other states, permits doctors to dispense medicine.

Only doctors and pharmacies enrolled in this program may prescribe or dispense this medication.

Why you should ask this question: Some doctors dispense sleeping pills eagerly and refill prescriptions indefinitely, while others feel strongly against putting patients on long-term medication.

More than 50 percent of doctors in training fall into this category at many inner-city hospitals, where such doctors dispense the bulk of front-line care.

But, he adds, "if a doctor or pharmacy is actually dispensing this product for anti-aging purposes, that's different and it may be illegal."

Yet reckless doctors and diet clinics dispensed them to millions of pudgy Americans who demanded access to the latest weapon in the endless battle against overweight.

While doctors dispense all medications in Japan, the world's second-largest prescription drug market after the United States, few in America do so.