A new study demonstrates that one in three Medicare patients are receiving painkillers from multiple doctors, Fox News reported.

The numbers were recently published in the British Medical Journal after researchers analyzed 1.8 million seniors enrolled in Medicare who receive the opioids, like hyrdocone, oxycodone, and morphine. 

Overall, the researchers found that around 35 percent of the sample set was prescribed opioids from more than one physician; 23.1 percent of them received narcotic painkillers from two providers; 9.5 percent from three providers; and 7.9 percent from four or more providers. 

Additionally, the study notes that risk of hospitalization increases for the 35 percent of patients that are receiving the addictive medications.

"Patients with four or more prescribers were twice as likely to be hospitalized for narcotics-related complications than patients receiving the same number of prescriptions from a single caregiver," said co-author Pinar Karaca-Mandic, an assistant professor at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health, in a press release. 

According to the National Institutes of Health, prescriptions for opioid medication has increased three-fold in the past 20 years. As Fox News notes, many health experts blame the increase of the prescriptions for the increase of heroin use and overdose, since many pill addicts switch to heroin. 

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is reportedly working on new initiatives to curb the rampant rates of prescriptions and the resulting addictions by encouraging doctors to make an effort against over-prescribing the medications.

"As physicians, we tell patients not to drive when they take opioids, but we also need to tell them that it can be dangerous to receive these medications from more than one provider," said author Dr. Anupam Jena, assistant professor of health care policy at Harvard Medical School to HealthDay. 

"I thought it would be 5 to 10 percent. When we ran the numbers and it turned out to be 30 percent, we were shocked."