Mayo Clinic Proceedings published a new article entitled, Buprenorphine Maintenance Therapy in Opioid-Addicted Health Care Professionals Returning to Clinical Practice: A Hidden Controversy. From the article: When considering all of the aforementioned issues with buprenorphine diversion, it does not seem reasonable to prescribe this medication to an HCP (Health Care Professional) with a history of opioid … Continue reading Buprenorphine Maintenance and Health Care Professionals
Category: Policy
Sentences to ponder
Further along the theme of blindness to one's own bias: It is therefore striking that libertarians, who are in fact uninclined to talk about family breakdown, seek to overturn a policy that does more damage to American families than any other. Conor Friedersdorf arguing that the single best thing the US government could do for families is … Continue reading Sentences to ponder
I can’t sleep no more…
Ta-Nehisi Coates reminds us that human error will exist, whatever the drug policy, and uses a recent police killing of an unarmed 18 year old to point out that the stakes are very high when anything is criminalized. When people talk about ending the War on Drugs, or decriminalizing marijuana, or reining in stop and frisk, they … Continue reading I can’t sleep no more…
The limits of empiricism
While listening to On Point last week I was struck by an argument on a show that focused on Charles Murray's new book. I have no interest in arguing the merits of his thesis here, but he believes that, for a variety of reasons, America has been dividing by class and he is profoundly concerned about the … Continue reading The limits of empiricism
Even more on the DSM-V
The Fix follows up on the previous piece about the coming changes in the DSM-V. The writer captures my concerns: I don’t foresee any negative results from dropping those two misguided terms. (abuse and dependence) But what does concern me is the fact that rather than still having two separate and distinct conditions—one, a short-term, … Continue reading Even more on the DSM-V
More on the DSM-V
The Fix has a good opinion piece on the DSM-V, praising its movement away from dependence and abuse. The focus on dependence also implied that cocaine—which does not produce physical dependence—isn’t “really” addictive. That lulled many people in the '80s—including yours truly—to think that cocaine wasn’t likely to be hard to kick. We all know better now. … Continue reading More on the DSM-V
Establishing residence in hell
Saving lives is good an important, but something about this feels like building an addition on a house in hell. Naloxone is a medication administered usually by injection which rapidly reverses the effects of opiate-type drugs such as heroin, including the respiratory depression which can cause what are normally referred to as 'overdose' deaths. ... The … Continue reading Establishing residence in hell
At what cost? By what right?
Why I'm drawn to and repelled by Megan McArdle: ...no policy question is ever as simple as "How can we stop X", unless "X" is an imminent Nazi invasion. We also have to ask "at what cost?" and "by what right?" She's so smart, but can frequently appears to be blind to her own bias … Continue reading At what cost? By what right?
Stupid and driven by bad motives
I recently listened to an interview with a comedian who grew up in Washington DC at the height of the crack epidemic. It's a too rare inside perspective from someone inside a community ravaged by crack: GROSS: So how did the crack epidemic affect your neighborhood? THURSTON: It was - I think the first thing … Continue reading Stupid and driven by bad motives
A New Paradigm for Substance Use Disorder Treatment
From Robert DuPont, MD: Substance abuse treatment is committed to abstinence from nonmedical drug use. Yet, continued nonmedical drug and alcohol use and relapse are so common that they are often defined as part of the disease itself. A “new paradigm” for care management has been pioneered over the past four decades by the state … Continue reading A New Paradigm for Substance Use Disorder Treatment
Recovery Review 