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In-Office Opiate Treatment "Not a Panacea"
Physicians Slow to Embrace Therapeutic Option
Brian Vastag
JAMA. 2003;290:731-735.
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| Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings. |
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A drug trumpeted as a major advance in opiate addiction treatment is garnering a tepid response from physicians, despite its status as the first such treatment available outside licensed drug treatment clinics. Bureaucratic hurdles, lack of clinical guidelines, and unfamiliarity with addiction have all hampered physician adoption of the drug, buprenorphine.
While less strictly regulated than methadone, buprenorphine can be prescribed only by physicians who complete an eight-hour course and register with the Department of Health and Human Services and the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA).
But even after receiving a special DEA number, individual physicians and physician group practices—no matter how large—are limited by law to 30 buprenorphine patients, a figure several people interviewed for this article called absurd.
"That [limit] is going to have to change before there's widespread use," said Michael G. Hayes, MD, director of the Center for Addiction Medicine, part of the University of . . . [Full Text of this Article]
THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES
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Equity In Private Insurance Coverage For Substance Abuse: A Perspective On Parity
Barry and Sindelar
Health Aff (Millwood) 2007;26:w706-w716.
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