A question was asked about the last post that warrants top billing:

“Buprenorphine acts similar to opioid agonists in lower doses, with the same addictive potential as oxycodone or heroin. In higher doses—doses above 8 mg or 8000 micrograms per day—the ‘ceiling effect’ eliminates interest and cravings for the drug.”

Ceiling Effect

I’m not sure I followed this. Can you explain more? What would you think about someone who is taking 1-2mg of Suboxone twice a day without a prescription, and says they want to stay on that dose once they find a prescriber? Are they better off on 8mg or more per day, or would it be ok for a prescriber to keep them at the lower dose? Is the answer the same if they hope to taper off the medication completely within a year (they don’t feel able to do this on their own right now, but hope to be able to when some life circumstances change). Thanks!

This gets a bit complicated, but I’ll do my best. A couple background issues; buprenorphine has a ‘ceiling’ to its effect, meaning that beyond a certain dose, increases in dose do not cause greater opioid effect. That is the mechanism for how buprenorphine blocks cravings.

If the blood level of buprenorphine is ABOVE that ceiling, the opioid receptors are maximally, 100% stimulated. If the person takes more buprenorphine, and the blood level increases, the opioid receptors don’t feel the increase, as they cannot be stimulated more than 100%. But more importantly: when the person takes less, and the blood level of buprenorphine goes DOWN, the receptors also sense nothing– as long as the level stays above the ‘ceiling’ level.

Read the above paragraph, and think on it until you grasp it– as it explains buprenorphine and Suboxone. If you understand that paragraph, you will know more about Suboxone than most doctors!

Below that ceiling level, the opioid effect from buprenorphine varies directly with dose—just as with oxycodone, hydrocodone, heroin, etc. Medications that have effects that increase with dose are called ‘agonists’. Buprenorphine is a ‘partial agonist;’ it acts like an agonist up to point, the ceiling effect, beyond which increases in blood level have no greater effect.

The level of this ‘ceiling’ varies from one person to the next, depending on efficiency of absorption (on average, only a third of a dose is absorbed from under the tongue), body size, liver function, differences in regional blood flow, and the presence of other medications that affect buprenorphine metabolism. In order for buprenorphine to have the unique, craving-blocking effects, the blood level of buprenorphine must stay above the ceiling level, for the reasons described above.

Lower levels (blood levels of buprenorphine below the ceiling level) still have SOME effects on cravings. Buprenorphine has a long half-life, an that alone reduces the desire to take more—especially if the medication is taken more than once per day– since the blood level drops very little between doses. For agonists or for buprenorphine below the ceiling level, drop in blood level equals drop in opioid effect, equals sense of things wearing off, equals cravings.

But the classic method for treating with Suboxone, as described in the certification course, is for it to be given at a high enough dose to stay above the ceiling level… and dosed only ONCE per day. If the blood level stays above the ceiling level, once-per-day dosing covers cravings completely. Yes, people still want to take more, especially initially, but that desire is not driven by chemical effects; the desire is instead based on psychological factors, like habit, or from being accustomed to feeling better after a dose, and getting a placebo ‘lift’ from taking a second dose.

A person can eliminate that second dose fairly easily, providing that the morning dose is high enough, i.e. usually 8-16 mg. To eliminate the second dose, the person should distract him/herself as soon as the thought about taking the second dose comes to mind. Immediately, do anything else—the dishes, call a friend, wrestle with the dogs… and the thought will pass. If the person does the distraction method for a few days, the need to take the second dose will go away—a psychological process called ‘extinguishment.’

Dosing every other day, and even every third day, has been studied; people cannot tell the difference, if the dose is raised enough to keep the blood level above the ‘ceiling’ (providing the person is given a placebo that tastes the same).

As for as the writer’s friend… I’m not a fan of any illicit use, but I am aware of the shortage of physicians. When the person has a physician, in my opinion the person should be prescribed a dose that allows for once per day dosing. Realize that buprenorphine wears off VERY slowly; it takes over three days for half of a dose to leave the body! So that ‘need’ to take more is almost always entirely learned or ‘conditioned.’ The medication does not wear off in that short period of time.

Even if the person has withdrawal symptoms, the sensations are almost surely imagined. How to tell? Use the distraction method, and note that a couple hours later, when the person remembers that the dose was skipped, note that the withdrawal went away. That doesn’t happen with ‘real’ withdrawal!

The sense of withdrawal that drives the second dose is simply a memory; a conditioned response that the body has that triggers the person to take more opioid. We become conditioned by drug use, just like the salivating dogs from science books! In the case of opioids, whenever we feel down, we think that an opioid will lift us up, as it has hundreds of times before. And even if what is taken is not a real opioid, the mind ‘feels’ a boost, just from expecting what has always happened in the past.

As for tapering, I look at many factors in order to recommend, or not recommend, stopping buprenorphine—things like age, presence/absence of using friends or contacts, physical health, mood, support network, personal motivation to stop buprenorphine, ability or lack thereof to dose once per day, consistently, number of relapses and personal ‘recovery’ plan, etc.

Realize that EVERYONE looks forward to a day when life circumstances will change for the better—but most of the time, life becomes more, not less challenging. Yes, it is nice to have a reliable job… but it is much more stressful being the sole breadwinner for a family with children, than working to pay for one’s self! Marriages settle down in some ways over time, but they also lose the intense infatuation that can gloss over personal differences.

As I have often written, it is VERY hard to stop opioids. It is a little easier to stop buprenorphine; I am convinced of that fact because I have seen opioid addicts taper off buprenorphine, but I know of no opioid addict who tapered off an agonist. But SOME people cannot taper of ANY opioids—including buprenorphine. I do not consider those people ‘addicted’ to buprenorphine, because they lack the constant obsession for opioids that is so destructive to the mind of an active addict. But they ARE physically dependent on buprenorphine— a fair trade, in my opinion, for a life of chaos, broken relationships, legal problems, and death.

I guess I do get irritable sometimes…  but I’m getting better at controlling my anger as I get older.  One cool thing about a blog is that I can go back and see what I wrote years ago.  In this case, I was looking for a post about telling the difference  between opioid toxicity (from taking too much) versus opioid withdrawal. In that post I suggested looking at the size of the pupils.  The name of the post, in case anyone is interested, is called ‘abres los ojos’– the name of an old Penelope Cruz movie and spanish for ‘open your eyes.’ 

Penelope Cruz sounds very cool, by the way, when she whispers ‘abres los ojos…’ as you can hear at the beginning of the movie trailer.  The movie was remade and called ’Vanilla Sky’– again with Penelope Cruz, but this time with her speaking in English.

Am I the only one who cares about this stuff?!

The post BEFORE that one was from a time– 2009– when people often wrote to tell me how misguided I was for recommeding buprenoprhine.  Those comments, at a time when so many young people were dying from overdose, would really get to me.  I’ll share the exchange, for old time’s sake.  For people who enjoyed my older, feisty posts, they are still out there– you just need to keep hitting the ‘earlier posts’ button!

The post:

This guy doesn’t like Suboxone– or the horse it rode in on.  He has been trying to write angry posts under my youtube videos, but I have been blocking them– His feelings about Suboxone popped up on one of the health sites out there this morning, catching my attention through ‘Google alerts’ for Suboxone.  It must be the same guy, because the complaints are the same, the language is the same, and in both cases the screen names are related to frogs(!).  I will go ahead and post his comments, and then my response, so that he can relax– knowing that he has done his part in the epic struggle over Suboxone.

Ive looked all over the internet and still have not found more then 5 people who have quit suboxone like i have. I took it for 12 months tapered down to 2 mg and quit 5 days ago..Basicly i am writing this due to the fact that i am really pissed at the fraud i feel is being commited by the drug maker of suboxone. I was taking 15 10 mg a day of percocet and 10 mg a day of norco a day b4 i got on sub. Anyways the reason i am so pissed is that these last 5 days have been the worse 5 days ive ever had.My Dr says oh youll just feel little tired for a few days is all.. ya right… 5 days of not being able to move,anxiety,depression you name it.. and no i am not crazy i took pills for shoulder injury so i have an idea where these feelings come from and its the good ole subs that all these Drs are making a fortune off. You must remember that out of all My drs patients i am like the only one whos quit totaly and can actually sit here and tell you what its like.. Its terrible and after considerable thought i think people need to know this sub is just another opiate and what gets me is the withdrawls are even worse then reg opiates. I CLOSE WITH ONE LAST COMMENT: ITS ALL ABOUT THE MONEY WHEN IT COMES TO SUBS: Think twice before some slick talking Dr wants you on it.. its far from a magic pill. Just ask the few of us out of 1000000,0000 people who quit the phoney stuff.

There is no magic pill for addiction to pain pills and if you think sub is then think again..One last thing, try and ****** suboxone withdrawls and guess what youll find??? first 50 sites pop up are paid for by the drug maker of sub and you have to dig to find real facts from patients with experience.. Drug maker pays big bucks to keep all the info ” positive” on subs… They are no dam different then the crooks on wal-street !

My Response:

Before my answer, a quick comment–  I do like the ‘crooks on wal-street’ remark;  I haven’t seen that ‘play on trademark words’ before.  I am assuming that he was making a joke–  he had to be, right?

OK, here is my response.  As usual it is a bit ‘snotty’– but you have to remember that I get this garbage all the time, and it gets old:

I am sorry to be the one to break this to you, but you are an opiate addict. Moreover, you will always be an opiate addict; hopefully you will be an addict ‘in remission’. The brain pathways that make up ‘addiction’ are laid down in a manner that involves memory processes; becoming a ‘non-addict’ would be like forgetting how to ride a bike. It cannot happen. Again, you can be in remission, but with opiates, that is very difficult– and unfortunately very uncommon.

Many people write about how they used will power or vitamins or some other silly technique to quit opiates– once they have gone over 5 or 10 years, I am interested in listening to them. It is easy to quit using for a year– it is another thing entirely to quit using for 10 years. I got clean in 1993 and felt pretty proud of myself… I quit through AA and NA, not Suboxone. I worked with opiates the whole time, giving patients IV fentanyl, morphine, demerol, etc in the operating room… but in 2000, thanks to a little market in the Bahamas that sold codeine over the counter, I relapsed. I ended up losing almost everything, including my career, all my money, a vacation cottage, my medical license… ****** ‘mens health’ and ‘the junkie in the OR’ and you will read my story.

There is no ‘fraud’, no ‘slick doctors’. There are doctors trying to help, and some work harder than others to keep people on track. We now know that Suboxone is best thought of as a long-term treatment, just like most other illnesses; we treat diabetes, hypertension, asthma, etc with long-term agents; if you stop your blood pressure meds abruptly you will have ‘rebound hypertension’ that can be very dangerous… Suboxone is similar to any other treatment. The thing is, pharmacy companies never used to care about addiction; the money is in treating other illnesses– just watch the commercials on TV! The money has been in viagra-type drugs! Suboxone is the first generation of opiate-dependence medications; the next wave will have fewer side effects, and so on. That is what happens with every disease. I am glad addiction finally has the attention of pharmaceutical companies. As for ‘slick docs’, there are many easier ways to make a buck in medicine! I am at the ‘cap’ of patients; the money I make treating patients with Suboxone is a tiny fraction of what I made as an anesthesiologist; I could drop the Suboxone practice tomorrow and take one of the 30 jobs in my area frantically looking for psychiatrists and make as much or more money. Yes, there probably are some ‘bad docs’ out there– there are ‘bad everythings’. But a bad doc will make a lot more money treating ‘pain’ using oxycodone than treating addiction with Suboxone! For one thing, there is no cap on pain patients! And when a doc wants to prescribe Suboxone, he/she can have only 30– THIRTY– patients for the first year. Hard to get rich on 30 patients!

Suboxone has the opiate activity of about 30 mg of methadone. When tapering off Suboxone, the vast majority of withdrawal symptoms occurs during the final parts of the taper– the last 2 mg. That is because of the ‘ceiling effect’. But you are not just tapering off Suboxone…

Do you remember when you started Suboxone, how lousy you felt, and how Suboxone eliminated the withdrawal? YOU NEVER FINISHED GETTING OFF THE STUFF YOU WERE ADDICTED TO. There is no ‘free lunch’; Suboxone allowed you to avoid all that withdrawal; if you stop Suboxone, you have to finish the work you never finished before– going through the withdrawal that you ‘postponed’ with Suboxone! Welcome to the real world– you likely abused those pills for years, and if you don’t want treatment with Suboxone, you had better start a recovery program, or you will be right back to using again.

Human nature can be a disappointment at times… When I ‘got clean’ after my relapse 8 years ago, I was just grateful to be ‘free’– even for just a few days of freedom! To get to freedom, I was in a locked ward for a week, no shoelaces (so I wouldn’t hang myself!), surrounded by people who were either withdrawing or being held to keep them from self-harm (it was a psych ward/detox ward combined). After that, I was in treatment for over three months– away from my family all that time, and I couldn’t leave the grounds without an ‘escort’ (no, not that kind of ‘escort’!). Treatment started at 6:30 AM and ended at 10 PM. The rare ‘spare time’ was used to do assignments. After those three months I was in group treatment for 6 years, and also AA and NA meetings several times per week. I still practice and active program 8 years later– I know what happens to people who stop: they eventually relapse, and some of them die. I AM NOT EXAGGERATING ‘FOR EFFECT’ HERE.

I had better stop or I will spend all of 2009 with this post… My final comment: Most of what you are feeling is not ‘Suboxone withdrawal’. I have watched many people stop Suboxone; some have bad withdrawal, some have NONE. When you talk about ‘anxiety’ or other problems facing life on life’s terms, you are experiencing life as an untreated addict. ADDICTS WHO SIMPLY STOP TAKING THEIR DRUG OF CHOICE FEEL MISERABLE!!! That is not withdrawal, and it doesn’t go away! Suboxone held things ‘in remission’ and allowed you to pretend you were not an addict; it is NOT a cure. So now, off Suboxone, you will see what it is like to live life as an opiate addict without treatment– and if you don’t get treatment, you will likely relapse. You will relapse because untreated addicts find life intolerable.

My human nature comment– everyone wants good things, but nobody wants to do the work to get them… (I’m in a bit of a mood today I guess– sorry). Recovery from opiates has always taken work– very hard work. And even then, success was rare– most people had to go back to treatment over and over and over before finally getting it. If people stopped working, as I stopped working in 1997, they eventually got sick again. Enter Suboxone: now you can have instant remission from active addiction! So are people grateful for that fact? That now, instead of years and years of struggle, they can take one pill each morning and hold their addiction in check? NO. Now they complain that ‘I don’t feel good when I stop Suboxone!’. Sorry, but a part of me says ‘poor baby’. You have a fatal illness, and you think you are done with it… you will find going forward that you will either use, or you will take buprenorphine or a new medication along the same line, or you will be attending meetings for life. Those are your three choices– pick one.

If you find a 4th choice, tell me about it in 5 years. I would like to hear how you did it, and yes, I hope you do find it (rather than die using). But I looked for that other path myself for years and never found it, and so did millions of other addicts.

Back to the present…

Phew.  Makes me tired just remembering those days.  Since then the number of deaths have only gone up, but at least there is a better acceptance for treating opioid dependence using effective medications— at least for people ready to accept that help.

Every now and then I hear about a therapist or addiction doc who is doing such a disservice to the practice of addiction medicine as to deserve special mention.  This week’s award goes to a certain counselor at a treatment program in Oshkosh, WI, who I’ll refer to as ‘This Jerk.’

I’ve made no secret, over the years, about my hope for addiction to eventually be treated with the same respect for patients and attention to medical principles as for any other illness.  I certainly try my best to work according to those ideas, and find that doing so really helps when it comes to making treatment-based decisions.  In other words, I’ll ask myself—if this person had diabetes, what would an endocrinologist do?  Or better yet—if I had diabetes, what would I want MY endocrinologist to do?

This Jerk Counselor

We all know that certain professions attract certain types of people.  Some of us have been pulled over by the cop who was the kid subject to playground taunts, now all grown up, determined to make life a living Hell for anyone with a loose seat-belt.  When I worked in the state prison system, I worked with guards who belonged in the same category; men and women who loved to carry keys to cages that held real people.  It’s the power trip, I suppose.

This Jerk apparently loves the power trip of ‘treating’ people who are sent back to jail for ‘failing’ his treatment.  He doesn’t have to worry about being a lousy therapist; he has a captive audience, and likes it that way.  One difficult aspect of being a therapist is treating patients who don’t like us for one reason or another, or who don’t kneel every time we enter the room.  But when This Jerk feels disrespected, he picks up the telephone and calls the patient’s PO to report ‘noncompliance with treatment’– then gloats about sending the patient to jail.

Treatment professionals who are in a position of unusual power over a patient must be particularly careful to empathize with their patient’s position.  In medical school, we were placed on gurneys and wheeled around by fellow students, to emphasize the vantage of patients coming to the emergency room.  We were taught to sit at the same or lower eye-level of our patients, as speaking down to people creates an unsettling power differential.

The power to prescribe or withhold buprenorphine (let alone the power to send to prison!) comes with an obligation not to abuse that power.  Withholding buprenorphine causes patients to go into withdrawal—something dreadful to people addicted to opioids.  Worse, withholding buprenorphine places patients at very high risk of relapse—which in turn places them directly in harm’s way from overdose and legal repercussions.

This Jerk, I’ve been told, takes issue with psychiatrists who continue to treat patients on buprenorphine who struggle with sobriety.  He considers it ‘good care’ to withhold buprenorphine from an addict who uses, supposedly to punish the patient into sobriety.

In case This Jerk (or a similar ethically-challenged counselor) is reading, I’ll point out the obvious:  when a doctor pulls the rug from under a patient by withholding medication, that patient might easily join the ranks of other dead addicts.  On the other hand, when I work with a patient who is struggling with sobriety, keeping the person on buprenorphine and working to identify triggers for using, that person almost always ‘gets it,’ eventually.

I’ve been working with people addicted to opioids, using this approach, for so long that the other approach—the punitive, ‘cut ‘em loose for struggling’ approach—seems barbaric.  I don’t understand how people identified as healthcare workers (nothing professional in his behavior!) rationalize the dismissive approach.  I suppose, if This Jerk views addicts as the scum of the Earth, or as people with weak characters, or people who lack ‘will power,’ punishing relapse by withholding treatment feels about right.  But most of us leave that world behind when we commit to helping people suffering from illness.

What’s This Jerk’s excuse?  Is it that he just doesn’t get it?  Or are there other motives at play?  With the current cap on patients on buprenorphine, the most lucrative way to practice is to keep turnover high, rewarding practices that hire therapist-idiots like This Jerk.

Or is it the power trip– that people with difficult addictions are an affront to therapists?  I’ve met therapists with this attitude before, who seem to have a form of codependency with their patients. They take credit for any success by their patients, but think the patients who fail are not worth their time, and should be dumped, expunged, or kicked-out to relapse and die.  I suppose This Jerk would say ‘not my problem!  I did MY job!’

Readers may suspect that this topic irritates me—and they’re right.  Maybe I’ve seen more death, up close, than the typical counselor.  I’ve attended autopsies; I’ve reviewed post-mortem photos from overdose scenes; I’ve pushed IV fluids into people with fatal injuries who presented for emergency surgery.  I have spent hours with the parents of young patients who died from overdose.  I’ve seen the parents’ faces as they struggled with the thought that they could, or should, have done something else—just one more thing to save their child.  Death, to me, is not ‘theoretical.’ It is not something to toy with, and certainly not something to invite into the life of a person who made me angry, for not recovering at MY pace.

I suspect that the Jerks of the world will continue to justify their sadistic approach to ‘treatment.’ But patients—at least SOME patients—don’t have to put up with that behavior.  People like This Jerk hold power over an individual with an addiction history, but there is power in numbers.  It is not appropriate to use one’s power vindictively, or to gloat over a patient’s struggle.  It is not appropriate to humiliate a patient in front of others.  If you see that behavior, collect witnesses, and bring it to someone’s attention.  Maybe that ‘someone’ will write a blog post about it!

Doctors in particular should treat patients with ALL diseases—including addiction—with respect.  It is not respectful, or ethical, to deprive a patient of life-sustaining medication—especially out of spite.  I look forward to the day when the thought of ‘kicking someone off Suboxone’ is viewed as similar to kicking a poorly-compliant teenage diabetic off insulin.

Would THAT make sense— even to This Jerk?

I often talk to my patients on buprenorphine (aka Suboxone) about the need to fill their minds with new ideas, plans, and experiences.  For years, those of us with addictions were focused on one thing– finding a way to avoid being sick for the next few hours.  That one issue became the center of our Universe, pushing out every other interest in our lives.  Treatment with buprenorphine removes that obsession, leaving room behind for interests to re-develop.  The challenge for patients on buprenorphine, particularly young patients, is to seize the initiative, and to fill their minds with healthy interests, relationships, and activities.

Many treatment professionals completely miss the point of buprenorphine treatment.  The unique action of buprenorphine at the mu receptor results in a constant level of opioid effect, even as the brain level of buprenorphine varies throughout the day.  This constant stimulation disappears through the phenomenon of tolerance; a process that allows the mind to ignore ANY input or stimulus that never varies.

The mind, then, has no evidence that the person is on a medication– so the person ‘feels’ normal, and IS normal– as normal as anyone can be, in a world with caffeinated beverages and wifi networks.  All of the mental activity that was spent fretting over opioids is removed during buprenorphine treatment– a process that really should be called ‘remission treatment,’ given what is occurring in the mind and brain.

I’m getting far afield here… my point is that the removal of all that ‘fretting’ allows for the interests of the person to return. The relationships pushed out and neglected by cravings can be restored, and hopefully repaired.  Hobbies can be taken up again.  Athletic interests can return.

But people who became attached to opioids at a very young age may have missed the normal opportunity to develop those relationships and interests.  Young people must develop interests in other things, once they are stabilized on buprenorphine. As an older person, I am not ‘hip’ to all of the things that younger people do these days (as evidenced by saying ‘hip’!), so I have to leave much of that to the creative energy of those patients!  But as an example of the things one can get interested in, this morning I had a few minutes of ‘do nothing’ time… and after watching one of the stars of ‘The Artist’, the silent movie that one all the Oscars, I Googled ‘silent movies’ and started reading.  Eventually I somehow ended up at a site for a college Asian Student Association (would LOVE to visit at least one Asian country some day…) where I viewed beautiful photos from Taiwan, including the countryside, the cities, the food…. and eventually the YouTube video below, of the Taiwan 2010 New Year firework display, at the world’s SECOND tallest building (for now) – Taipei 101.  (before clicking the link you just past, do you know the first?)

Watch in HD if possible–  turn  of the volume, listen to the people around you, and you’re almost there!

Today I met with representatives from Alkermes who were promoting Vivitrol, a long-acting mu opioid antagonist that is indicated for treatment of alcoholism and opioid dependence.

Naltrexone

I admit to some pre-existing bias against the medication.  I’m not certain, to be honest, whether that bias was based upon sound clinical reasoning, or whether it was based on personal, negative reactions to naltrexone in my past.  Or maybe, as a recovering opioid addict, I have negative feelings about anything that blocks mu receptors!

Vivitrol consists of naltrexone in a long-acting matrix that is injected into the gluteal muscle each month. The medication is expensive, costing about $1000 per dose (!)  That cost is usually covered by insurance, and like with Suboxone, Wisconsin Medicaid picks up the tab save for a $3 copay.  Alkermes, the company that makes Vivitrol, also has a number of discounts available to reduce or even eliminate any copays required by insurance companies.

I’ll leave the indication of Vivitrol for alcoholism for another post.  The indication for opioid dependence came more recently, and appears more obvious, given the actions of naltrexone at the mu opioid receptor.

In short, naltrexone blocks the site where opioids—drugs like oxycodone, heroin, and methadone—have the majority of their actions.  Blockade of that site prevents opioids from having any clinical effect.  There is some dose, of course, where an agonist would regain actions— an important feature in the case of surgery or injury.  But even in those high doses, the euphoric effects of addictive opioids would be muted.  People on Vivitrol, essentially, are prevented from getting high from opioids.

Back in my using days, I took naltrexone, thinking that doing so would help me get ‘clean.’  I didn’t wait long enough, however, and so I became very sick with precipitated w/d.  The makers of Vivitrol recommend waiting at least a week, after stopping opioids, before getting an injection of Vivitrol.  I suspect that a week is not long enough to prevent w/d, but I realize that it would be very difficult to expect patients to last longer, without using anything.  I would expect that any precipitated w/d could be reduced through use of comfort medications, at least for a day or two until the symptoms are mostly gone. This requirement, though, to be clean for a week or more is one of my problems with the medication.

As an aside, I was also prescribed naltrexone (oral tabs) at the end of my three months in residential treatment, and I took the medication for another three months.  I had no withdrawal or other side effects to naltrexone at that time.

Another issue was the concern that naltrexone has been connected to hepatic toxicity.  We discussed that issue today, including the studies that led to that connection—which are not compelling.  The discussion allayed most of my concerns about liver problems from Vivitrol.

Finally, I have always recommended buprenorphine over naltrexone because of the anti-craving effects of buprenorphine that result from the ‘ceiling effect’ of the medication.  I worried that naltrexone, by blocking the actions of endorphins, would actually increase cravings.  But that is not what the data shows.  In the studies with Vivitrol, cravings for opioids were dramatically reduced by the medication.  The mechanism of that effect is not entirely clear;  some of the anti-craving effect may be psychological, as addicts stop wanting something when they know there is no way to get it.  But there may be other complicated neurochemical effects at presynaptic opioid receptors that are not fully understood.

The bottom line is the result of treatment;  the very sick opioid addicts treated in the studies used by Vivitrol to gain FDA approval showed a profound reduction in opioid-positive urines, over a span of 6 months.

I suspect that I will continue to favor buprenorphine.  I do not buy into the ‘need’ some people describe to ‘get of buprenorphine as fast as possible.’  Buprenorphine is a very effective, safe, long-term treatment for inducing remission of opioid dependence.  But because of the cap, I am glad that another option is available to treat this potentially-fatal condition.  And I admit to perhaps being too quick to judge Vivitrol, which appears to be a safe alternative—particularly for people who have a lower opioid tolerance that do not want to push it higher, or for people who have been free of opioids for a week or two.

I would invite local people who are on my buprenorphine waiting list to consider Vivitrol as an option.

Below is an e-mail that I changed just enough to hide the person’s identity.  Every week, I receive messages that describe similar situations.

My husband has struggled GREATLY with substance abuse since in his 20′s; he is now in his mid-40′s. He is the kindest sweetest man and he is the BEST husband and father. When he is using he becomes someone he is not. We have run the gamut from jail to overdose.  Six years ago a friend introduced him to Suboxone and it LITERALLY gave him his life back. He bought it off the friend for years, where it was very expensive. Finally I brought him to a doctor a bit over a year ago. She is pretty adamant about weaning him off of Suboxone.

From experience, I know that 2-3 months after he stops Suboxone he will relapse. I strongly believe it IS a MIRACLE drug! I agree in the sense that if a diabetic needs insulin to save his life, you give it for a lifetime. My husband over the last 6 years has been the man of my dreams, the man I always knew he was. I have extreme anxiety because I know this doctor is just doing her job and trying to follow guidelines however my husband’s LIFE is at stake!  It’s not like if he stops this med he could ‘just’ have depression;  he could end up in jail, or worse. He has his life back. He is enjoying his family life as he should.

If this is what it takes for him to live a normal life then why not?  When we ask his doctor about staying on Suboxone, she says her concern is that we don’t know the long-term effects. She doesn’t want to keep anyone on any med without knowing what it could do. She says it hasn’t been on the market long enough. 

My husband had a SEVERE opioid addiction. He was taking 10-15 Oxycontin 80mgs a day and then ended up switching to 400mgs of methadone before he switched to Suboxone. He has found that he is comfortable with 4 of the 8mg pills per day. I believe it is because he was used to taking such high doses of opioids. He has tried really hard to decrease Suboxone for his doctor but I see the anxiety build in him. She says no one in her practice is on that dose. To be honest he was taking more when he was buying them from a friend but brought himself to a stable 4 pills per day when he started with the doctor. He and I both REALLY like her and would like to continue treatment with her. I wish I had a DVD of little clips of our life from before and after Suboxone. I am positive she would be floored. I am positive she would understand my concern. In my eyes my husband is back. He is such a beautiful soul and I hate to see that taken away from him yet again.

Doctor I read up at the top of this blog that you agree with a lifetime use. He currently has no noted side effects. Do you have any suggestions that I may present to his doctor? I dream of the day that she says it is alright for him to continue on this until maybe he chooses to wean if he so chooses to do so. That would alleviate SO MUCH stress on both of us. Please let me know what you think.

Anyone who reads this blog knows that I agree with most of the opinions expressed in the email.  I know how horrible things are for active opioid addicts—and for the families of active opioid addicts.
More and more physicians pay lip service to ‘addiction as a disease,’ but most do not yet treat addiction as a disease.  The comments about diabetes are ‘right on.’ One could substitute a number of diseases to demonstrate the same point.  We physicians have few illnesses that we cure; rather we manage illness over a person’s lifetime— and opioid dependence is clearly a life-long illness.

To address a couple points in the message:  the active ingredient in Suboxone, buprenorphine, has been in clinical use for over three decades, and has established a clean safety profile.  Buprenorphine has not been used at the high doses employed for treating opioid dependence for quite as long, but even that track record is significant, i.e. 8 years in this country, and longer in Europe.  Most physicians would not consider an 8-yr-old medication to be a ‘new drug!’

The situation described in the message is, in my opinion, the result of several factors.   First and foremost, the reluctance to prescribe buprenorphine is a consequence of stigma.  Doctors prescribe new antidepressants, pain relievers, blood pressure treatments, and cholesterol-lowering agents with much less concern over ‘safety.’     I wonder, frankly, if safety is the concern—or whether there is an unconscious sense that patients addicted to opioids, or to other substances, don’t deserve an ‘easy way out’ of their problem; that sitting through a miserable detox is  a more fitting ‘treatment’ than a pill that makes things better.

I come to this cynical conclusion only because the alternative—that buprenorphine is ‘dangerous’—doesn’t make sense.  The risk of any medication must be compared against the risk of not using that medication.  As the message states, we know the risk of ‘not treating’ the woman’s husband!  Similar comparisons are used to justify the use of chemotherapeutic agents that have severe toxic effects, including the risk of killing the patient.  As I’ve written in prior posts, the fatality rate from untreated opioid dependence is as high as for many cancers.  So does it make any sense to withhold buprenorphine out of safety concerns?!

There are other reasons for doctors’ reluctance to prescribe buprenorphine. Many fear they will do something wrong, and run afoul of the DEA during an audit—a process that all buprenorphine-certified prescribers are subject to.   Some doctors feel pressure from friends and family members of patients, who often blame the doctor for keeping the patient ‘stuck on Suboxone.’  Some doctors want to maintain high patient turnover in order to keep money  coming in, since practices are ‘capped’ at 100 patients per certified physician.

Finally, I think many doctors see ongoing treatment as less satisfying than a ‘cure.’  They consider residential treatment the gold standard, and buprenorphine as a less-intensive alternative.  They buy into the idea that the addict can be returned to ‘normal’—whatever that is—if he/she works at recovery hard enough.  I understand the thought, as that is the type of treatment experience that I went through.  But on the other hand, the relapse rate for opioid dependence, after residential treatment, is very high. I myself relapsed after seven years of recovery, losing my career, and almost my life.  During my years as medical director of a large residential treatment center, patients discharged as ‘successfully treated’ often became repeat customers, at least until they lost their job and health insurance.  Some of them– too many of them–died.

I won’t get into the specifics of treatment;  I’ll leave that to her husband’s doctor to work out.  But I do hope that the doctor will give some thought to whether stopping this life-saving treatment is truly in the patient’s best interest.

To the patient’s wife– I encourage you to continue as an advocate, and I hope your doctor will understand your perspective.

I was stunned to see this story about the town of Brattleboro, a town in Vermont with a name famous for the rats that grew up there.

As an aside, my PhD thesis involved working with vasopressin receptors in the brain, and that is why I’m familiar with Brattleboro rats– a species of rat that spontaneously mutated and lost the ability to make vasopressin.

One would think that inhabitants of a town made famous over a rat would be on their best behavior.  But they behaved worse than their namesakes at a meeting intended to get the OK for a clinic to treat people using Suboxone.  I’ll let you read the article, while I get back to what I was doing when I stumbled across the article.  What a bunch of…

Ah, forget it.

A recent experience with a patient helped me realize some of the dramatic differences in the treatment of opioid dependence, in an era of buprenorphine.

I drug-test patients who are treated with buprenorphine or Suboxone.  The point of testing is not to catch someone messing up, but rather to determine when a person is in trouble.  It would be great if we could simply rely on the word of our patients, but once a person is using opioids, his/her own ability to know what is true falls apart. All of us who treat addiction have heard patients rationalize relapse as something they ‘had to do’ for one reason or another, for example.  The effects of active using on insight are why I like the use of ‘DENIAL’ as a mnemonic for ‘Don’t Even Notice I Am Lying.’

The effects of relapse on telling the truth are part of the profound impact of using on a person’s insight.  Insight disappears very quickly during active using, as the mind abandons the broad view and becomes focused on one goal. Before buprenorphine, drug testing was in some ways more, and other ways less important.  It was more important because after relapse, the person was immediately thrown back into the world of desperate scrambling, where risks for consequences are high.  On the other hand, testing was less important—or maybe necessary– because experienced addictionologists (and spouses) could see the effects of using, including the loss of insight, in the active addict’s eyes.

I was one of those people who experienced that rapid loss of insight after my relapse, back in 2000. For years I had attended AA and NA; hundreds if not thousands of meetings over seven years.  I remember comforting myself that ‘if I ever get off track, at least I now know where the door is to get back.’  I didn’t realize that at the instant one relapses, that door becomes nowhere to be found.

In retrospect, I don’t know if the door actually disappeared. I suspect that with the right attitude, that same door would have opened for me.  But the honesty and humility that I needed, in order to ask for help in finding and passing through the door, were suddenly replaced by the need for secrets—secrets about everything.  As soon as I relapsed, nobody could be trusted. Nobody would understand me.  I was on my own.

Contrast that with the experiences of patients on buprenorphine who relapse with opioid agonists. As I compare their experiences to mine, I realize that I am using the experiences of a couple people to make broad generalizations.  But I have seen a number of examples that support these generalizations, that have consistently followed the paths that I’m about to describe.

One patient—call him ‘Paul’—told me about his relapse before I even mentioned that I would be asking for a urine test.  In fact, he was eager to tell me about his experience, as if he looked forward to getting it off his conscience.  “I have to tell you that I really screwed up last week,” he said. When I asked him what happened, he said that a friend who he hadn’t seen for several months came through town and stopped by his house.  With little warning, his friend pulled out a bag of heroin and a couple clean needles, tossed them on the table, and said ‘let’s fire up.’

After shooting the heroin, Paul immediately felt disappointed in himself.  Unlike in the old days, he felt nothing from the heroin.  While his old friend nodded off next to him, Paul wondered what the heck happened—and immediately wanted to talk to me about the situation.

His desire to talk is an amazing thing—and worth noting.  Without buprenorphine, a person who relapses is not generally eager to speak to his/her sponsor, let alone counselor or physician.  In those cases, the mind reels from an avalanche of shame, and the need to keep secrets—even from one’s own awareness—becomes paramount.

There are many buprenorphine programs that would discharge a person for one relapse—and in such cases, I would not expect the same type of honesty from patients.  I don’t get the logic of those programs, and I become angry when I think about them.  As I’ve said before, if a person relapses, that person NEEDS help—not abandonment!  I believe that the proper approach to treating addiction can be found in almost all cases simply by considering opioid dependence to be another chronic illness.  And if someone with heart disease overexerts himself and comes in with chest pain, we don’t boot him from treatment!

Paul made an appointment to talk about his experience.  He explained how he felt when his old buddy contacted him, and we discussed ways to avoid meeting up with ‘old friends’ in the future.  He discussed the urge to escape when he saw the paraphernalia—to escape from life’s responsibilities—and we talked about how difficult it can be to simply tolerate life sometimes, and the powerful effects of triggers and cues.  Most interesting to me, as a psychodynamic psychiatrist, he talked about a complicated set of thoughts and feelings that came up when he saw the drugs—questions about who he was, about shame, about the heavy load that comes with doing the right thing, and about the pressure of not letting people down.  Those are all big issues, I said as I agreed with him.  How much easier, at least for a few moments, to just be ‘nothing’—to have no expectations about one’s self!

We talked about the challenge of being ‘someone’– of being proud of one’s self.  It feels good to do the right thing– but it may also feel bad.  Am I letting my old friends down, if I do better? I suggested that he might watch the old movie, Ordinary People, where a younger brother struggles after surviving an accident that claimed the life of his brother.

Before buprenorphine, people struggled with opioid dependence largely on their own.  Yes, we had twelve step groups—and still do—but twelve step groups place the responsibility to get one’s act together squarely on the back of the using addict.  Many people in AA or NA will say that “AA is a selfish program.”  It has to be.  When one relapses, one is left with his own distorted insight, accumulating consequences until, hopefully, he finds his way back to the pathway established by the simple program of the steps.

On buprenorphine, relapse doesn’t necessarily cause instant loss of insight.  I don’t mean to minimize relapse, as bad things can always happen.  For example, I have had patients stuck in a pattern of chronic relapse that was difficult to straighten out, even though there was little or no psychic effect from the drug being abused.  But from an optimistic standpoint, relapse on buprenorphine stimulates a deeper investigation into what is missing from the person’s life, and a renewed effort to gain what is missing.

This assumes, of course, that the person is not simply tossed from treatment for the relapse.  In that case, other people are left trying to figure out what happened—when the obituary appears a few months later.

There are ongoing efforts to eliminate the cap on treating people for opioid dependence with buprenorphine or Suboxone.  I don’t know what the odds of success are, but the efforts would benefit from public demand.  If you have had difficulty finding a doctor with room under the cap, write a letter or email that explains just how important the issue is to you, and send it to the address(es) below.

The change requires an Act of Congress, or perhaps an executive order from someone high-placed in the Dept of Health and Human Services.  Consider sending a ‘cc’ to your elected representatives in the Senate or House of Representatives.  I am not excited about using NAABT.org, since they tend to be patsies for Reckitt-Benckiser (I’ve asked to have a link to this blog, or to our 6000-member forum on their web page, but they won’t– but they link to an R-B – supported forum instead– draw your own conclusions).  But this issue is too important even for my own righteous anger to get in the way!

Send comments to the following e-mail or mailing address:

NAABT, Inc.
P.O. Box 333
Farmington, CT 06034

Email address:
MakeContact@naabt.org

A Reader Writes:

Message:

The State of XXXXXX prescription price list noted Target Pharmacy as the cheapest for Suboxone at $6.99/Suboxone pill, 8mg-2mg, qty. 30. So I started getting my prescriptions filled at Target.

Well, needless to say they raised their prices twice since then and I am now paying $8.158333/Suboxone pill, 8mg-2mg, qty. 30, Nov. 12, 2011.

My question: How can they be alowed to jack their prices up so fast and so high in a short period of time? What can I do? It’s like they pulled a bait and switch on me.

Please write back Dr. Junig

My Reply:

I sympathize with you.  The best thing you can do is have an educated and educatable doctor– someone who has enough humility to recognize when he/she is wrong, and adjust accordingly.  Somebody who recognizes that as physicians, we are constantly sorting through new data, responding clinically to phenomena according to science.  Most importantly, someone who recognizes that in medicine, as in all fields, people make assumptions about things with partial data, and sometimes later learn that their assumptions were wrong.

I realize that is difficult in the current era when people with addictions are considered ‘manipulative’ for simply raising appropriate questions.  The truth is also competing with the marketing and persuasion tactics by Reckitt-Benckiser– a company that has found a way to influence policy-makers in government and addiction societies.  I am generally a fan of corporate greed, as I believe that the marketplace is the best stage for ideas to rise or fall (mixing several metaphors, I know!)  But I am appalled by the extent of involvement of Reckitt-Benckiser, the British corporation that makes Suboxone, with physician societies– the groups that are supposed to be advocating for policies that save lives that are being lost to addiction.

The generic tablet of orally-dissolving  buprenorphine, 8 mg, is FDA-indicated for treating opioid dependence.  In Wisconsin, some pharmacies have it for as
low as $2.35 per tab;  the more expensive places sell it for $3.00.  It is CLINICALLY IDENTICAL to Suboxone;  the naloxone in Suboxone is not absorbed sublingually (actually, 3%-5% is absorbed, but does nothing clinically), and after being swallowed the naloxone is completely destroyed at the liver by first pass metabolism.

Suboxone is supposedly safer then generic buprenorphine because naloxone supposedly causes withdrawal if injected.  This is the only justification (initially put forth by the folks at Reckitt-Benckiser) for the need for Suboxone.  The justification is flimsy, since many people who would benefit from the lower price of buprenorphine have very little risk of injecting the medication.  But worse, the flimsy justification is a lie. People who have injected Suboxone intravenously (I have met and heard from many of them) report NO withdrawal from naloxone-containing Suboxone.  What’s more, people who wrote to me who have injected both buprenorphine and Suboxone, at different times based based on availability, have all reported the same thing– that the subjective experience from injecting either substance is identical.

I must point out here that there are MANY reasons to avoid injecting any substance– but particularly a substance made to be taken orally.  These compounds contain fillers that destroy the capillary beds of the lungs, where oxygen is absorbed– potentially leading to severe lung damage.  And infection is always a huge risk, when placing poorly-sterilized material directly into the bloodstream.  Please– don’t do it.

Back to taking buprenorphine properly… the high cost of Suboxone is an unfair burden for patients without insurance coverage, when a much cheaper, idential alternative is available.

I am going to remove your name and location, and put up your question on my blog;  you are then welcome to bring a copy of the post to your doctor. You can also tell him/her to read prior posts, where I explain all of this in greater detail.

For Doctors and Insurance Formulary Committees:

I implore you to look into the facts of this situation with an open mind.  I have a PhD in Neurochem, besides 10 years of experience as an anesthesiologist and training and experience in psychiatry.  Some insurers cover buprenorphine;  they are, of course, the smart ones.  Your company can save a great deal of money by simply allowing the generic equivalent to be covered.  States that mandate the use of Suboxone or Suboxone Film could save large sums of money for their taxpayers.  And doctors–  your cash-paying customers could really use the break, especially in this economy.  If you are concerned that a patient is injecting medication, I understand your hesitancy— even though, frankly, it is misplaced, given that BOTH Suboxone and buprenorphine can be injected.  If your patient pays cash, and never injected medication, do you REALLY think that person is going to start injecting buprenorphine– since doing so would not create any effects?  The ‘ceiling effect’ is in place for ANY route of administration, so a patient taking sublingual Suboxone, who injects buprenorphine, will feel… NOTHING.

Give your patient the gift of affordable treatment as a Christmas present.  You may be saving someone’s life.

JJ