The drug naloxone reverses overdoses, but it needs to be used as a tool -- not treatment – in saving lives, much like a defibrillator for the heart attack victim. We need more effective ways to save people from drug overdoses, explains Karen Perry, Executive Director of the NOPE Task Force.
Georgia has put a one-year moratorium on issuing licenses to clinics that use medication-assisted treatment for opioid addiction, NPR reports. Legislators say Georgia put a cap on the number of clinics because it wants to determine why so many opioid treatment programs have opened in the state.
When addiction treatment specialist Zev Schuman-Olivier, MD, found that young adults taking buprenorphine to treat their opioid addiction often stopped using the medication, he began looking for a novel way to address the problem.
The overdose antidote naloxone is becoming easier to buy around the country, the Associated Press reports. Most states have passed laws allowing people to buy naloxone without a prescription. Drugstores and other retailers are also making it more easily available.
Top headlines of the week from Friday, June 3- Thursday, June 9, 2016.
A group of senators is urging the Department of Health and Human Services to raise the number of patients a doctor can treat with the opioid addiction medication buprenorphine to 500, The Huffington Post reports.
The Food and Drug Administration has approved Probuphine, an implant that contains the opioid addiction treatment buprenorphine. The drug has been available in oral form for 14 years, CNBC reports.
Top headlines of the week from Friday, May 20- Thursday, May 26, 2016.
A New Jersey program immediately connects people to treatment after they have been revived from an opioid overdose with naloxone. Recovery specialists are contacted by hospitals participating in the program once an opioid overdose call has been dispatched.
Opioid addiction treatment experts say although the evidence is clear that medication-assisted treatment is the best way to tackle the nation’s opioid epidemic, there is still a stigma attached to using these medications.
Most jails and prisons do not provide medication-assisted treatment for opioid addiction. Experts tell NPR that for inmates who are forced to detox from methadone, tolerance for opioids decreases, while cravings increase. This raises their risk of overdose after they are released.
The news that Prince was rescued from an overdose of the painkiller Percocet with the drug naloxone six days before he died underscores the challenge of using the life-saving tool, public health experts tell The Wall Street Journal.
A facility in Baltimore that offers a full range of opioid addiction treatment options is serving as a model to centers in other parts of the country, according to Stateline.
Top headlines of the week from Friday, April 22- Thursday, April 28, 2016.
Join Together spoke with Kelly J. Clark, MD, MBA, FASAM, DFAPA, President-elect, American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM), about the opioid addiction medication buprenorphine.
A new study finds people who become addicted to drugs later in life are more likely to relapse during treatment, compared with those whose addictions started earlier.
A new study finds monthly injections of the anti-addiction medication extended-release naltrexone (Vivitrol) can significantly decrease relapse rates among people addicted to opioids. The study included 153 adults who formerly had been incarcerated and had a history of opioid dependence.
Representative Elijah Cummings of Maryland criticized the maker of the opioid overdose antidote naloxone Tuesday for increasing the price of the drug as demand has increased. He spoke at the Full House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform hearing on the heroin epidemic.
A Senate committee on Wednesday unanimously passed an amendment that would greatly increase access to buprenorphine to treat opioid addiction, according to The Huffington Post.
Top headlines of the week from Friday, February 12- Thursday, February 18, 2016.
Almost 500 people in Vermont are on waiting lists to receive medication to treat their opioid dependence, Stateline reports. More than half will wait almost a full year.
The opioid overdose antidote naloxone is being offered free to high schools around the country by the drugmaker Adapt Pharma, according to U.S. News & World Report.
Despite the rising rate of addiction to opioids, a relatively small number of doctors are authorized and willing to prescribe buprenorphine to treat opioid addiction, according to Stateline.
Do school nurses REALLY need naloxone? The answer is YES. The data about drug overdose is alarming. Our youth are at risk and school nurses recognize the danger.
An advisory panel to the Food and Drug Administration recommended Tuesday that the agency approve the buprenorphine implant Probuphine as a treatment for opioid addiction.
Get Support
