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On-site heroin urged for chronic addicts

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Fri, 05/28/2010 - 4:57pm
CBC News
 
Supervised medical treatment with heroin leads to significantly lower use of street heroin by chronic addicts than does injected or oral methadone, according to a study to be published Friday in the medical journal, Lancet.
 
The randomized controlled trial involved heroin addicts who were receiving conventional oral methadone treatment but continued to inject street heroin regularly.
 
The study was conducted over six months by researchers at King's College in London, led by psychiatrist John Strang.
 

Warning issued after bad heroin hits Kelowna

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Wed, 05/05/2010 - 2:00pm
By Jeremy Deutsch - Kamloops This Week
 
For the second time in two months, drug users in Kamloops have been put on notice about a deadly batch of dope that could be hitting the streets.
 
In this latest case, the concern for outreach workers is an extremely potent batch of heroin from Kelowna.
 
“My guess is, if they are seeing it down there — with the proximity between [Kamloops and Kelowna] — we’ll see that same heroin [here],” Bob Hughes, executive director of the AIDS Society of Kamloops, told KTW.
 
While cases of the potent drug have turned up in the Okanagan city, Hughes said it hasn’t yet arrived in Kamloops.
 

First free heroin clinic opens in Denmark

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Tue, 02/23/2010 - 6:09pm
AFP
 
COPENHAGEN – After years of contention, Denmark on Monday opened its first clinic equipped to distribute free heroin under medical supervision to people heavily addicted to the drug.
 
The Scandinavian country joins a number of countries like Switzerland, the Netherlands and Germany to allow prescriptions for medicinal heroin, or diamorphine, to be written out to a small group of addicts so hooked on the substance that more traditional substitutes like methadone have no effect.
 
The clinic is set to serve only 120 of some 300 hard-core heroin addicts, or only about one percent of all drug addicts in the country.
 

Landmark heroin study set to begin in Vancouver

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Mon, 12/21/2009 - 8:00am
Treatment clinic, part of SALOME research, will examine therapy for addicts who have not responded to methadone

By Justine Hunter, The Globe and Mail

Nursing guideline helps overcome stigma of Methadone

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Wed, 12/02/2009 - 6:46pm

Registered Nurses' Association of Ontario

 TORONTO, Dec. 1 /CNW/ - A pregnant woman walks into a hospital in early labour. She feels nauseated and achy; her contractions are 20 minutes apart. There is more to her story than meets the eye. She is on methadone maintenance therapy (MMT) and wasn't able to pick up her daily dose at the pharmacy this morning. Although her story may be hard to believe she is one of the estimated 17,000 clients in Ontario currently receiving MMT. Methadone is a legal substitute therapy for patients addicted to opioids, such as heroin, and prescription narcotics like OxyContin.

Methadone clinic will help hundreds, physician claims

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Wed, 11/25/2009 - 8:56pm
By Matthew Sitler
 

Once Bracebridge’s new methadone clinic gets going, it could cater to about 250 individuals on a regular basis, says Dr. Jeff Daiter, executive director of Ontario Addiction Treatment Centres (OATC), which runs the clinic.

Speaking at an information session at Riverwalk Restaurant Thursday evening, Daiter outlined his new clinic’s operation and touched on the user groups who are benefiting from its services.

He stressed the urgent need for methadone treatment in the local community.

He said many people using methadone “are really the drug addicted.”

Opinion: Heavy-handed rules harm methadone treatment

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Tue, 11/24/2009 - 10:07pm
By. Dr. Philip Berger

Something extraordinary happened at a recent conference of Ontario doctors who use methadone to treat people addicted to heroin and other drugs.

The usually well-behaved and deferential physicians booed and jeered their licensing and regulatory body – the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario – and they were joined by patients and other health-care professionals.

The unprecedented public derision erupted during an attempt by the college to justify its targeting of these doctors with special audits, and for singling out methadone patients for invasive monitoring. The outburst was the culmination of 13 years of increasing resentment, and will hopefully herald bold new opposition to the unfair regulatory system that burdens these doctors and their vulnerable patients.

Pioneer heroin study in jeopardy in Quebec

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Mon, 11/23/2009 - 6:00pm
By. Andrew Chung, Toronto Star

MONTREAL–Some called them drug dealers. Others said they enabled a terrible habit.

But researchers in Montreal and Vancouver were vindicated when their controversial study showed giving pure heroin to hardcore heroin addicts was more effective than methadone to treat the addiction.

Now, as doctors prepare to launch a second phase of the groundbreaking medical trial, which they hope will lead to heroin becoming a permanent treatment option, Quebec has balked at funding the Montreal clinic, effectively stopping the research, the Star has learned.

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