Suboxone A New Alternative To Methadone Treatments

There will be a new publicly funded treatment to treat opiate dependents, so methadone will no longer be the only alternative for these patients.

This decision of the General Directorate of Pharmacy (DGF) to provide this public funding through the National Health System (SNS) has been very well received by Socidrogalcohol, the Spanish Society of Dual Pathology and the Spanish Society of Drug Addiction.

This new drug is marketed under the name Suboxone and is a combination of buprenorphine and naloxone. This drug is really nothing new because it was already approved in 2008, but the lack of public funding made it practically inaccessible.

Among the advantages that Suboxone offers are its ease of taking and above all that it does not offer overdose risks. Suboxone offers great safety for patients since it is an oral drug with a "ceiling effect", which means that a higher dose does not produce a greater effect in the patient.

This treatment also favors the social integration of people addicted to heroin since when dispensed in pharmacies, like medicines for other people, and allows them to have the treatment for several days instead of having to go daily to take your dose of methadone.