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Abstract
As a treatment agent for opioid dependence, buprenorphine is a nearly ideal medication at our current stage of medication development. Unlike methadone, buprenorphine dosage can be rapidly adjusted with minimal potential for inducing severe consequences. In addition to its intrinsic safety, buprenorphine’s relatively low abuse liability in the combination product (i.e., with naloxone as Suboxone®) makes it even more acceptable in regulatory quarters as well as to prescribing physicians. The approval of buprenorphine as a pharmacotherapy for opioid dependence returns to physicians the ability to treat their opioid-dependent patients with an effective opioid-based treatment for the first time in nearly 100 years. Buprenorphine is an opioid, however, and potential for misuse remains, even in combination with naloxone. Whether buprenorphine will be increasingly accepted as a treatment for opioid-dependent patients depends on clinicians recognizing the advantages of its uniquely useful properties while still heeding the need to manage their patients’ therapy with reasonable vigilance.
Financial & competing interests disclosure
Walter Ling has received unrestricted educational grants and has served occasionally as a consultant to Reckitt-Benckiser, manufacturer of Subutex and Suboxone. The author has no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed.
No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.