A Fresh Look at a Quick Fix for Heroin Addiction. The New York Times explores the controversial procedure in which withdrawal is precipitated rapidly by giving an opiate antagonist to a patient under general anaesthesia; a number of patients have died in high-profile cases. Critics say it’s a moneymaker for hospitals and clinics to treat high-rolling celebrity addicts. My concern is that, psychologically, addicts are addicted not so much to drugs as to quick fixes — for their ‘jones’, and for coping with stresses. The use of their drug of choice has replaced, or prevented the elaboration of, other options for coping. This new technique is essentially just another quick fix, and will leave the pitiful addict bereft of replacement strategies that would develop during a more gradual rehabilitation from drug dependence. In short, it won’t prevent the unchanged, vulnerable, addiction-prone person from relapsing.
And next question: what position will health insurance providers, who historically want to do as little as possible for their chemically dependent customers, take on paying for the treatment? Two possible scenarios: (1) Despite evidence that doing the procedure safely (after all, it does involve general anaesthesia, and it has killed people…) necessitates inpatient hospitalization, they may refuse to cover costs; (2) They may push people toward the procedure, despite its physiological and psychological dangers, as more expedient than the detox admissions they now pay for. Over the past decade, I’ve seen inpatient detoxes whittled down from 21 to 7, 5 and now most commonly 3 days under managed care pressure; here’s a great opportunity for cost-savings by pushing the envelope down further.
This search connects you to previous FmH discussions of opiate addiction, including a reference to the investigation of the physician whose patients were dying during rapid detoxification.
When I read the Times‘ headline above, I thought for an instant I might find mainstream press discussion of ibogaine, the powerful (and toxic?) hallucinogen the administration of which is reputed in underground circles to ‘cure’ opiate addiction, about which I’ve previously written. The difference between this and the rapid naloxone withdrawal the Times discusses is that ibogaine, according to published accounts, might precipitate a searching reappraisal of the self creating change in the psychological as well as the physiological grounds for the addiction-proneness. Here’s a Google search on ibogaine.
