Seekers.

'Seekers' are people who are addicted to prescription medication (usually narcotics), who have typically been denied at their first source so they move on from clinic to clinic. The Doc who runs this clinic is pretty stringent, I've seen 3 new 'patients' taken out in handcuffs in the 4 weeks I've been there. He catches them by calling their 'references' or following up on their 'records'. He placates them long enough to keep them where they are, so that the police have time to get there (they usually arrive in a few minutes).

Today we had a seeker, but that Doc was already off for the day. The other two Docs are older and, while brilliant, couldn't defend themselves against a fly. Well, when the seeker discovered that he was being found out and wasn't going to receive his 'medication', he flew into a rage. I am certainly not a violent person and only fight out of necessity, but I have in my past brought people down who needed to be subdued. I got very aggressive back at him to let him know I meant business, but not far enough to provoke a physical attack. He ended up leaving empty-handed a few minutes later.

I remember a somewhat similar experience in one of the ERs I worked in, with a schizophrenic patient who hadn't been taking her meds. I was in her room washing my hands at the sink, and she started speaking jibberish filled with expletives. A tech walked in the room and she lept out of her bed and attacked them so forcefully that the glass door they fell into, fell out into the hall taking both of them with it. Of course there were about 8 of us right there to cease the attack, but it was still a pretty jarring experience (especially for the poor tech, who thankfully was unharmed physically).

Always good to be on the defense, especially when there are narcotics (or schizophrenics off their meds) involved.