While several addiction medications exist that effectively eliminate withdrawal symptoms, stigma and legal hurdles bar patients from access.
The National Institute On Drug Abuse recommends several medications for opioid overdose, withdrawal, and addiction, all of which have been approved by the FDA. While Naloxone,
the widely popularized life-saving overdose reversal medication has become widely accessible since the pandemic, less is known about the medications that help those with substance use disorders cope with withdrawal and addiction.
“Imagine someone who is using a substance and coping with trauma, a history of severe adverse events in their life, and then tries to stop using the substance which they are using to cope and then go through an agonizing withdrawal process. That makes it all the more difficult to enter recovery.”
Some of these medications include daily tablets or monthly injections of Buprenorphine, Naltrexone or even Methadone. According to the John Hopkins school of public health, and the Pew Charitable trusts, federal regulations that were meant to make these prescriptions more accessible have actually made them more difficult to come by, requiring physicians to go through additional training or in the case of Methadone, dispensed only by specially certified providers in particular facilities.
“Management of withdrawal has become more challenging because fentanyl sticks in the body for so long. Causes such a significant and severe withdrawal process that we are finding people are less likely to stick it out in a detox setting or a hospital setting.”
Experts say that access to medicine would aid in recovery and some could even stop using addiction medicine altogether.
“Then over time, very very gradually, if the person is amenable, withdrawing that medication for addiction treatment. Again, very gradually over time, or just keeping that individual on it.
This is very reasonable, it’s in a controlled setting, it’s a substance that’s predictable, we know exactly what it is, we know how to dose it.”
Doctors hope to make addiction medicine just as ordinary and accessible as other common prescriptions.
“Our outpatient physicians have begun to incorporate medication for addiction treatment like Buprenorphine, Naltrexone, into primary care.
So, we have a number of family physicians and internal medicine physicians that have just been doing this as a part of primary care, just like prescribing diabetes medications or blood pressure medications. Medication for addiction treatment is just a part of that.”
While several addiction medications exist that effectively eliminate withdrawal symptoms, stigma and legal hurdles bar patients from access.