Bad Weather Take Home Doses for Opioid Treatment Program Patients

We’ve had some snowy days in my area, and this means administrators at our opioid treatment program must decide if we should provide extra take home doses to patients for the days when travel will be treacherous.

Because take home doses are closely regulated at opioid treatment programs, both for methadone and buprenorphine, we must get special permission from state and federal regulatory agencies to give extra take home doses. We do this by submitting what’s called an “exception request.” This is an online form where we describe why we are requesting an extra take home, and for whom it will apply. Part of our job is assuring the authorities we won’t give extra take homes to patients who can’t manage them safely.

Ultimately, it’s up to me, the medical director, to decide the risk level of each patient. Which is more dangerous, driving on snowy roads to get to the opioid treatment program to dose, or having an extra take home bottle of medication? I need input from the staff to make the best decisions, so this can be time consuming.

Admittedly, my program failed our patients this last week.

The trouble is, we must decide when to submit a request for extra take homes about 48 hours in advance. It may take a day to submit online and get the medical director’s signature, the state opioid treatment authority signature, and the federal agency signature. Then we must give out the extra take home one day before the harsh weather is predicted.

Sometimes it’s hard to forecast bad weather. Early this month, we got an extra take home exception for a day when ice was predicted. In our area, a few degrees can make the difference between ice and rain. As it turned out, no ice fell and it was a perfectly normal day for driving.

I think that over-reaction was in our minds when we were monitoring the weather last week. At first, weather was expected for late Tuesday night. We were expected to get 1-2inches. We discussed if we should submit an exception, and finally did so late Monday night. I signed it, and it was approved by state and federal authorities, but we chose not to enact the exception Tuesday morning, based on updated forecasts.

It was not the right decision.

Tuesday night, it began to snow during the wee hours. By early morning, we had 3-4 inches and it kept snowing until afternoon. Somehow the forecasted 1-2 inches turned into 8 inches, at least on my side of the Brushy Mountains.

I live in the Brushy Mountains, and have a very steep driveway. Really, really steep. Imagine the steepest paved road you’ve ever driven on, and crank that up a few more degrees and you have my driveway. Plus, it has two curves in it. The only way I can get my small Toyota down the driveway would be to ride it like a luge sled, so it stays in the garage during bad weather.

My fiancé has a four-wheel drive vehicle, so he takes me to work, or I call a co-worker to come get me and I walk down my driveway to the road.

A group of physicians who work at opioid treatment programs were discussing this issue of severe weather take home exceptions on our monthly conference call last week. We pondered the factors that help us decide:

1. Since buprenorphine has a greater margin of safety than methadone, I’m willing to grant bad weather take home doses for buprenorphine patients, unless there are other concerns to be considered.
2. Patients in the induction phase of treatment, the riskiest time in treatment for methadone patients, shouldn’t get extra take homes.
3. Patients who already receive take home doses for Sundays and holidays are likely OK for bad weather days, too.
4. Patients using alcohol or benzodiazepines are at higher risk, and may not be appropriate for extra take home doses.
5. Patients who live in a home with other people with active substance use disorders may not be able safely to store their medication, and may not be appropriate for the extra take home.
6. Patients who have had recent episodes of suspected diversion won’t get extra take homes.
7. Patients who live around the corner, are healthy, and can easily walk to the opioid treatment program don’t need extra take homes.
8. Patients who live in more treacherous terrain or longer driving distance may need take homes. Our opioid treatment program is in the foothills of the mountains, but some patients live in a spur off the Appalachian Mountains called the Brushy Mountains. We have some steep and winding roads.

That’s a rough idea of most of the factors that go into deciding who should get take homes and who shouldn’t.

Then there are transportation issues. I mistakenly thought Medicaid-funded patients, who ride a transportation service that contracts with Medicaid to provide transportation to medical appointments, could get their usual ride to the opioid treatment program. Later I found out they have only a few four-wheeled vehicles. On one of our worst snow days, they only transported dialysis patients and others with “life-threatening illnesses.” My patients weren’t transported.

So, now I know that I cannot count on this agency to get patients to treatment on bad weather days.

As a group, OTP physicians are re-evaluating criteria for extra take homes in these bad weather situations, along with some help from our SOTA (State Opioid Treatment Authority). I feel fortunate to live and work in a state with an active SOTA. These remarkable people are tireless in their quest to continually improve the quality of care for patients at opioid treatment programs. They are valuable allies for physicians.

Because that’s the bottom line: we all want the best and safest care possible for our patients.

Media Maintains Methadone is Menacing Mountains

 

NEWS CAT

Last week, a colleague of mine directed my attention to local news coverage of the opioid use disorder epidemic. It’s a four-part series titled “Paths to Recovery.”

Anytime the press covers opioid use disorder and its treatments, I feel hope and dread. I hope the report will be fair and unbiased, and give the public much-needed information. And I dread the more likely stigmatization and perpetuation of tired stereotypes about methadone as a treatment for opioid use disorder.

Overall, the four segments of this news report had some good parts, and some biased parts. It was not a particularly well-done series, and could have benefitted from better editing. It was disjointed and contained non-sequiturs, which I suspect confused viewers.

In the introduction to the first segment, the report says their investigators have spent months digging into treatment options in the area. Their conclusion: there’s a variety of options and treatment is not one-size-fits-all. The report goes on to give statistics about how bad the opioid use disorder situation has become, and they interviewed a treatment worker who says we’re two years in to this, and the community doesn’t grasp the seriousness of the situation. They also interviewed some harm reduction workers, and discussed naloxone rescue for overdoses and needle exchange.

So far, so good, except that of course we are more like two decades into the opioid crisis, not two years.

Part two of this series was “Mountain methadone clinics.” As soon as I saw the dreadful alliteration, I cringed, fearing the content of the segment.

This report didn’t say good things about methadone. In fact, one physician, supposedly the medical director of a new opioid treatment program in the area, says on camera, “Methadone is very dangerous. It has some effects on the heart. The rhythm of the heart, it has some drug interactions.” He went on to say that at the right dose, people could feel normal, and that it replaced the endorphins that were lacking, but I worry people will remember only that a doctor said methadone was a very dangerous drug.

Methadone can be dangerous, if you don’t know how to prescribe it, or if you give a person with opioid use disorder unfettered access to methadone. But in the hands of a skilled and experienced physician, at an opioid treatment program with observed dosing, methadone can be life-saving.

The news report outlined the failings of existing methadone programs in the area, saying staff had inadequate training, and failed to provide enough counseling for patients. It said one program made a dosing error and killed a patient, while another program had excessive lab errors.

All of that sounds very bad.

No positive aspects were presented as a counterpoint to that bleak picture. I felt myself yearning for an interview with a patient on methadone who has gotten his family back, works every day, and is leading a happy and productive life. Of course, those people are hard to find, since they are at work and harder to find by the media, even reporters who have supposedly been “working for months” on this story.

And then…of course they interviewed patients who had misused methadone. One person criticized his opioid treatment program because they allowed him to increase his dose to 160mg per day, and he said “…that’s a lot. I didn’t need that much…” and goes on to admitting to selling his take home medication. Another patient said the methadone made him “sleep all the time.” Another patient said methadone made him “high all the time.”

There will always be such patients…ready to lie to treatment providers to get more medication than needed, break the law by selling that medication, and then blame it all on the people trying to help them. Unable to see their own errors, they blame it all on someone else, or on the evil drug methadone.

Every program has such patients. But these people can also be helped, if they can safely be retained in treatment long enough, and get enough counseling.

Even though these patients are few, they get far more media attention compared to the many patients who want help and are willing to abide by the multitude of rules and regulations laid on opioid treatment programs by state and federal authorities. These latter patients are why I love my job. I see them get their lives back while on methadone. They become the moms and dads that they want to be. They go back to school. They get good jobs and they live normal lives. They don’t “sleep all the time,” as the patients on this report said.

But not one such patient was interviewed for this report.

As I watched this segment, I thought back to an interview the A. T. Forum did with Dr. Vincent Dole, one of the original researchers to study methadone for the treatment of opioid use disorders. This was in 1996, before our present opioid crisis gained momentum.

A.T. FORUM: It seems that, over the years, methadone has been more thoroughly researched and written about than almost any other medication; yet, it’s still not completely accepted. How do you feel about that?

1. VINCENT DOLE:It’s an extraordinary phenomenon and it has come to me as a surprise. From the beginning of our research with methadone we were able to rehabilitate otherwise hopeless addicts that had been through all of the other treatments available. I expected methadone would be taken up very carefully by the addiction treatment community, but with some enthusiasm. Instead of that, we’ve had endless moral and other types of objections which are really irrelevant to the scientific data.

I was surprised, because my background in research had led me to expect that the medical community was a very critical but nonetheless objective group that would respond to solid, reproducible data. Instead I find that we still get the anti-methadone argument of substituting one addictive drug for another.

This is ignoring the scientific data showing that, as a result of methadone treatment, people who have been hopelessly addicted and anti-social and excluded from any normal life or family, are in a wonderful way becoming responsive to social rehabilitation and today constitute a very large number of people who are living normal lives. The fact that people, especially medical practitioners, would dismiss that as unimportant simply staggers me!

[http://atforum.com/interview-dr-vincent-dole-methadone-next-30-years ]

 

What would Dr. Dole think now, twenty more years later, during a terrible wave of death from opioid use disorders, about the continued stigmatization of methadone?

Then next segment was about buprenorphine, and how it can be prescribed in a doctor’s office, making it a better choice for patients. It wasn’t a bad segment, and contained some useful information. Physicians who were interviewed had nothing but good things to say about buprenorphine.

Or rather, they had good things to say about Suboxone.

The brand Suboxone was heavily promoted by this piece. Not once did the reporter use the drug’s generic name, buprenorphine. Every time, the medication was called by its brand name, Suboxone, and every picture of the medication was of Suboxone film. No mention was made of the other brands: Zubsolv, Bunavail, Probuphine, or even that there are generic combination buprenorphine/naloxone equivalents for Suboxone film, for less than half the price.

I know buprenorphine is kind of a mouthful for non-medical reporters, but still, I thought it was odd to use only the name of one brand: Suboxone. It’s as if this was a commercial for that drug company. Indivior, the manufacturer of Suboxone, must be delighted with this coverage. To me, it felt like an advertisement rather than journalism.

Another segment was about sober recovery homes. The investigative reporter talked to owners of sober recovery houses and the tenants at those homes. She said NC has no regulations or standards for recovery homes. She talked on screen to a patient advocate who says patient brokering is going on in Asheville, as well as lab scams at recovery homes where the patients’ best interests aren’t at the heart of the way these homes function.

She talked to Josh Stein, NC Attorney General, about passing laws to better regulate these sober homes, and he agreed that if these laws were needed, they should be passed.

No controversy with that one.

There was a segment about how there’s not enough beds in residential facilities for patients with opioid use disorder who want help. I agree, though I’m not sure this is breaking news for anyone. I don’t think there’s ever been enough beds to meet the treatment need.

Overall, I was left with a bitter taste after this reportage. The news program missed an opportunity to educate viewers about all evidence-based treatments for opioid use disorder, but ended up doing an advertisement for Suboxone and denigrating methadone.

Buprenorphine and methadone both work under the same principle: they are long-acting opioids which, when dosed properly, prevent withdrawal and craving while also blocking illicit opioids. While buprenorphine is a safer drug with fewer drug interactions, it isn’t strong enough for everyone. Methadone has countless studies to support its use to treat opioid use disorder, showing it reduces death, increases employment, decreases crime… but why go on, since facts don’t seem to matter as much as sound bites.

In my opinion, WLOS bungled an opportunity.

Methadone Overdose Deaths: First Two Weeks

 

Methadone is a tricky drug to start, due to the narrow margin between therapeutic dose and fatal dose. Making it more difficult, people vary a great deal in the rate at which they metabolize methadone.  Some people have a methadone half -life as short as 15 hours, while others have half- lives as long as 60hours. The average is 22 hours. So even for people with a high tolerance to other opioids, increasing methadone too quickly can be deadly.

Methadone’s long half-life makes it good for a maintenance medication, since after stabilization, there’s not much fluctuation in the blood levels. However, the long half-life makes it more difficult to adjust the dose. The change I make in a patient’s dose today may not be fully experienced by the patient for five or more days.

The tolerance to the anti-pain effect of methadone builds faster than the tolerance to respiratory suppression, adding to the danger. When methadone is used inappropriately, patients may take more methadone to relieve pain, but by the time the pain is gone, they could easily have taken a methadone overdose.

All of this explains why the first two weeks of methadone maintenance treatment are the most dangerous. According to some studies, death rates for patients starting methadone at opioid treatment programs are actually higher during the first two weeks than when using illicit opioids. (1, 2)

Even so, it’s a risk worth taking, given the proven life-saving benefits of methadone (and buprenorphine) maintenance

Patient overdose during the first two weeks is a serious concern for doctors working at opioid treatment programs. We must do all we can to keep patients safe. It’s a fine line; if we start at too low of a dose or go up too slowly, we risk having our patients drop out of treatment. And if we increase the dose too quickly, it increases the risk of overdose…

The American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM) recently updated their methadone induction guidelines. In past years, doctors working at opioid treatment programs (OTPs) tended to start patients at 30-40mg and increase the dose rather quickly. Now, the expert ASAM panel recommends a starting dose of 10-30mg. If that dose isn’t sufficient to suppress withdrawal, a second dose can be given after three hours, so long as the total dose is not greater than 40mg. The expert panel recommends increasing the dose no more quickly than every five days, and no more than five milligrams at a time.

Some patients are more susceptible to overdose, and physicians should consider lower methadone starting doses for these people:

-Age over 60

-Using sedating drugs like benzodiazepines

-Regularly consume alcohol

-Are on prescription medications which can interact with methadone

-Medically fragile patients, for example patients with coronary artery disease, morbid obesity, -chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), or sleep apnea

-Have risk factors for prolonged QT interval, such as a recent heart attack, personal history of heart rhythm problems, or family history of heart disease

-Patients who have been abstinent from opioids for five or more days (e.g. recent incarceration, recent detoxification or hospitalization). These patients lose some of their tolerance and might be more prone to overdose with any opioid.

 

Interestingly, the degree of withdrawal that the patient has when entering treatment does not correlate with the dose of methadone they will need to get rid of withdrawal symptoms. In other words, one person in terrible withdrawal may need a smaller dose than another person with milder withdrawal. The degree of withdrawal that a patient feels is only partly due to opioid tolerance. Genetic makeup may be the reason why some people have more severe withdrawal than other people.

While I always ask my new patients how much opioid they have been using per day, that alone doesn’t determine methadone starting doses. There’s incomplete cross-tolerance between other opioids and methadone, meaning we can’t use the table of equianalgesic doses.

Last week I found an interesting article describing a large study of Canadian methadone patients, which will contribute even more to what we already know about risk during the first two weeks of methadone. This study showed which patient characteristics are associated with overdose death.

The study was done in Canada from 1994 until 2010, and covered over 43,000 patients enrolled in an opioid treatment program in those years. The study looked at all overdose deaths in this patient population and found 175 deaths deemed to be from opioids. These cases were matched with patients who entered treatment around the same time as the patient who died, creating a nested case-control study.

This study found, as expected, a higher degree of risk in the first few weeks on treatment. In this study, patients in the first two weeks of treatment were 16 times more likely to die in the first two weeks of treatment than any other time in treatment.

Psychotropic drugs were associated with a two-fold risk of overdose death overall, with antipsychotics associated with a 2.3-fold risk and benzodiazepines a 1.6-fold increased risk. Antidepressants were not associated with increased risk of overdose death. Alcohol use disorder diagnosis was also associated with a two-fold increase risk of overdose death.

Even more interesting, heart disease was associated with over five times increased risk of overdose death, and serious lung disorders (sleep apnea, COPD) were associated with a 1.7 times increase in overdose death.

This is a powerful study because it was so large.

This is information I can use. I’ve been stressing about patients whom I thought were at increased risk – those who use alcohol and benzodiazepines, and those with severe lung disease. While these patients are at higher risk, from this study it appears patients on anti-psychotics are at even higher risk. And I need to do a better job of getting patients to see primary care doctors, to screen for heart disease, which gave the highest risk of all.

As time goes on, I think we’ll get more information about which patients are at higher risk. Those patients need a higher degree of interaction with treatment center staff, and better coordination of care with mental health providers and primary care doctors. I know I plan to implement a system at the OTP where I work to make sure I see patients more often if they have the risk factors described.

Obviously any patient death is a terrible thing. Of course it’s worst for the family, but it also affects the treatment team. I feel badly for the families of those 175 patients in the Canadian study who died, but they gave us information that can hopefully help us provide better care for future patients.

 

1. Caplehorn et al, “Mortality Associated with New South Wales Methadone Programs in 1994: Lives Lost and Saved,” Medical Journal of Australia, 1999 Feb 1;170(3):104-109
2. Cousins et al, “Risks of drug-related mortality during periods of transition in methadone maintenance treatment: A cohort study,” Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment, October 2011, Vol 41(3); pp252-260.
3. Leece et al, “Predictors of opioid-related death during methadone therapy,” Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment, Oct 2015,

Genetic testing for methadone metabolism

 

 

 

Genomic medicine is growing quickly. This is a branch of medicine that studies an individual’s genetic profile in order to be able to predict which medications may work best. This information can also predict if a patient will have a problem with a specific medication.

Some people have genes that make them slow metabolizers of methadone. This is a particular problem, since methadone is such a long-acting drug. Slow metabolizers are at increased risk of methadone accumulation, leading to over -sedation and overdose death. If we had a way to identify slow metabolizers, perhaps we could prevent these deaths, by starting them at lower methadone doses.

Researchers at Washington University in St Louis have discovered genetic subtypes that are associated with both faster methadone metabolism and slower methadone metabolism.

Researchers took blood samples from normal volunteers for genetic testing, and then gave these test subjects doses of methadone. As expected, these people metabolized methadone at markedly different rates. So far, that’s not news. We’ve known for years that people metabolize methadone at very different rates. But this study showed what genetic variants influenced the rate of methadone clearance. Two genetic subtypes for the gene for cytochrome P2B6 were found; one increased the metabolism of methadone and the other resulted in slower-than-usual metabolism of methadone.

Interestingly, the researchers found that African-American people were more likely to have the subtype of this gene giving slower methadone clearance. These patients may be at increased risk for overdose, if given the same dose as patients with the genetic subtype resulting in faster methadone metabolism.

To the best of my knowledge, it’s not yet practical to get genetic testing done on a patient before I start methadone. Specialty labs do offer the testing, but my patients could not pay for it, unless it was paid for by insurance, including Medicaid.

Even after I get the information, how would I use it? For sure, if a patient had the genetic makeup of a slow metabolizer, I would start at a lower dose and increase more slowly. But I have no studies to guide me – I would be using my best clinical judgment.

What about a patient with the genetic makeup of a fast metabolizer? Would I feel comfortable starting at a higher dose and increasing that dose more quickly?

No, I would not. Perhaps that patient has a lower risk of overdose, perhaps not. Again, I have no studies that tell me for this certain gene, start at “x” dose. I don’t know that we will ever have that sort of specific information, since factors other than genetics must be considered.

I hope in the future I’ll see a role for genetic testing for patients starting medication-assisted treatment of opioid addiction. However, we would need studies showing how we can use the information. For now, the expense, turn-around time of testing, and lack of real-life studies using genetic information make genetic testing unworkable.

Confusion over Methadone Peak and Trough Levels

Recently I’ve had patients write to my blog describing how their opioid treatment program doctors are using methadone blood levels to determine the correct dose. What they described to me was worrisome; patients’ doses rarely need to be checked with methadone peak or trough blood levels. Due to tolerance, a methadone blood level may be adequate for one patient, but far too low for other patients.

A patient’s dose of methadone needs to be determined on clinical grounds. This can include the patient’s description of withdrawal symptoms and their timing related to dosing, physical exam just before the patient is due for a dose, and evaluation of the patient three to four hours after dosing. It may also include an evaluation of ongoing illicit opioid use, other medical issues, and other medication or illicit drug use.

Opioid treatment program physicians rarely need to check methadone blood levels. I usually check peak and trough blood levels when I suspect a patient may be a fast metabolizer who may do better with split dosing. In such a case, the patient describes feeling fine for the first part of the day but in awful withdrawal by night time, despite taking a relatively higher dose. Then if the patient’s peak (highest level) is twice the trough (lowest level) I know they may feel better with twice a day dosing. Certain medications can induce the metabolism of methadone, making the patient metabolize methadone more quickly and drop the blood level. Often in this situation, split dosing helps.

I cringe when patients say things like, “my doctor checks a methadone blood level on everyone when they get to 80mg to see if they need to increase the dose or not.” For the vast majority of patients, getting this blood level won’t be helpful. If it’s used to determine the patient’s dose, it could be harmful. Many patients will still feel withdrawal while dosing at 80mg, even though they may have what would be considered a moderate blood level.

Our patients are tolerant to opioids. For this reason, methadone patients who are doing well, feel fine and have normal lives can have so-called “toxic” blood levels of methadone. A level that would kill someone unaccustomed to methadone may be just what my patient needs.

Some doctors think all opioid addicts want to go higher on their methadone dose than they need, and that these addicts would want limitless dose escalations unless the doctor stops this. In some patients, addiction may drive the addict to ask for dose increases even when not needed. Addiction often tells the patient “more is better.”

I’ve seen this problem too, but not as often as one might expect. More often, I’m the one advocating for a higher methadone dose. Don’t get me wrong, I do want to use the lowest effective dose. Some patients, due to fear of methadone and the stigma against it, are afraid to increase their dose. I point out that studies show patients do the best in methadone treatment if they are on a high enough dose to block the withdrawal symptoms and block the euphoria from other opioids. Particularly if the patient is still using illicit opioids, I recommend a dose increase.

Lab tests aren’t an adequate substitute for talking to the patient and examine the patient. As we used to say when I was in medical school, about a billion years ago, “Treat the patient, not the lab result.”

The COWS Score: How Helpful Is It?

COWS stands for Clinical Opioid Withdrawal Scale, and it’s probably the most commonly used tool to determine the degree of opioid withdrawal experienced by the patient. The scale has eleven items related to opioid withdrawal. Some are subjective, like the question about the degree of anxiety or irritability the patient is feeling. Some items are strictly objective, such as pupil size and pulse rate. And some are sort of a combination of objective and subjective, like the question asking about both nausea and vomiting. The patient may report nausea and score points on the scale, and if the patient vomits, this scores more points.

I’ve worked in clinics that used the COWS for each dose increase, and I’ve worked in clinics that didn’t use the COWS at all.

I think it’s a good tool, but has some drawbacks. I use it during dose induction, particularly on a patient new to medication-assisted treatment. Sometimes patients aren’t sure how they’re “supposed” to feel on replacement medication, and a COWS score gives me a better idea of how much withdrawal they are in.

For example, I had a patient who felt much fatigue in the evenings. He’s been on the program about a month, and had been dosing at 70mg for about a week. He worked at a strenuous job, and got off work around 5pm. One day, he told the nurses that he needed an increase, since it felt like his methadone “gave out” as soon as he got home, and he had to take a nap before his evening meal because he was so sleepy. When the nurses heard him say “sleepy,” they correctly became worried he was on too much methadone, and sent him to see me. When I checked him just before dosing the next morning, his pupils were a wide 8 mm and reacted briskly to the bright light I shone in his eyes. He was in withdrawal and he felt better after a few dose increases. His use of the word sleepy was confusing, since to us, we worry “sleepy” means “headed towards a methadone overdose.”

Sometimes, a patient reports severe withdrawal but doesn’t score very high on the COWS. I don’t assume the patient is lying, because some patients don’t tolerate withdrawal symptoms easily. More commonly, I see patients, mostly long-term users, who are in what I would consider to be moderate or severe withdrawal by their COWS score, but they experience it as “not so bad, I’ve felt worse”

In another example, I had a patient on 110mg who reported terrible withdrawal, to the point she couldn’t function during the day. She was restless, anxious, jittery, and felt like her heart was racing. She wasn’t sleeping well. This was puzzling, since a month ago she’d been fine on that same dose. There were no new medications, no change in activities, and she wasn’t drinking alcohol (a common reason for drop in methadone blood level). On the COWS, she scored an 8, but when I looked at the actual COWS, she scored very high on the more subjective items, yet her pupils were pinpoint and her pulse rate in the 60’s

The more we talked, the more I suspected anxiety as the cause of her symptoms. She had a terribly stressful living situation. She was saving money to move out on her own, but felt like she had to endure the circumstances in the short term. In this case, she appeared to be blaming opioid withdrawal for her symptoms of anxiety, and anxiety was a normal response for what she was experiencing. She didn’t need a higher dose of methadone; she needed someone to help her think of better immediate options for safe housing.

I do not think a COWS score is helpful for fine-tuning a patient’s dose of methadone. Many times the COWS score doesn’t pick up subtle withdrawal, so I don’t tend to use it for higher dose changes.

COWS scores are helpful when defending one’s self from regulatory bodies. About five years ago, a state investigator took me to task for authorizing dose increases. “You just believe them when they say they’re in withdrawal?” she asked sarcastically. The investigator didn’t think I should increase the doses of those patients, and yet the studies clearly show methadone patients have better outcomes if they are on an adequate dose. By doing a COWS score, the patient’s signs and symptoms are recorded in the chart for an investigator to see.

In summary, the COWS scale is a useful tool, though probably more useful at lower doses. Like all tools, it’s helpful in some situations, but it’s not perfect. It should be used alongside our other tools, like talking and listening to our patients both before and after dosing, using blood levels in rare cases, and always asking about other medications or new medical problems.

Drug Interactions with Methadone

Recently, medical directors of opioid treatment programs in my state pondered how to handle the risk of medication interactions with methadone. In my area of the country, chart reviews of patients who died while taking methadone revealed many decedents were taking other medications with known interactions with methadone. Obviously, we want to prevent these deaths, and need to protect against drug interactions.

To predict a possible drug interaction, the OTP doctor must know all of the other medications that the patient is taking, both prescription and non-prescription. I assume all doctors at opioid treatment programs ask the patients what medications they are prescribed on the first day, along with what they take over the counter. That’s a good start, but often it’s not sufficient.

On that first day, patients aren’t feeling well. They are in opioid withdrawal and they yearn to feel better. They may forget about some medication or assume it’s not important to mention. They may forget about over-the-counter medications. Sometimes patients deliberately keep silent about medications if they’re worried they won’t be allowed to continue them. Most commonly this happens with benzodiazepines, but doctors can detect prescriptions for these controlled substances, since they are listed on our state’s prescription monitoring program.

Benzodiazepines are the most common drug found in patients who have died while prescribed methadone.

At my opioid treatment programs, we keep lists of our patients’ medications in their charts.
We tell patients to please tell us right away if they are prescribed any medications after they enter our program, so we are alerted to possible drug interactions. Patients are instructed to tell the nurses, since they see nurses most often, and the nurses then tell me. It’s OK for patients to tell counselors, but counselors aren’t medically trained so they must pass the information on the nurses and doctors.

Keeping an up to date list of each patient’s medications is challenging, but do-able with a good system in place. However, the list isn’t worth much unless the doctor is made aware of all prescribed medications, so each opioid treatment program’s system must include a way to provide the doctor with all this information.

At my programs, I sign a form giving my approval (or disapproval) of all medications that are prescribed for the patient, and I write orders if any further action needs to be taken, like asking the patient about any withdrawal symptoms or sedation. But this might happen a few days after the medication is started, so nurses also send me texts with notice of any new medication. This is the best method for me, since I can quickly text back with any orders for enhanced patient monitoring. One program sends emails which I can receive on my smart phone, read immediately, and send my response.

Opioid treatment program physicians need to know which medications can interact with methadone. This list can be long, and varies somewhat depending on the source of information.

Methadone interacts with other drugs in several ways; since it’s metabolized by specific enzymes in the liver, called the cytochrome P450 system, other drugs affect this system can affect the patient’s blood level of methadone. Sometimes other medications can induce, or speed up, methadone’s metabolism, which can drop the patient’s methadone blood level. Other medications inhibit methadone’s metabolism, causing the methadone blood level to rise. In the first situation, a previously stable patient may start to feel withdrawal. In the second situation, the patient may become sedated from methadone and even be at risk for a fatal overdose.

Other medications, mostly sedatives, act on the same centers in the central nervous system as methadone to produce even more sedation. These actions can be synergistic. Synergy between two medications means that the effect of two drugs is greater than you would expect. To put it another way, instead of one plus one equals two, suddenly one plus one equals three or even four. You get more effect than you bargain for.

Then there’s the whole QT interval prolongation that can be caused by methadone. Many other commonly used medications also prolong the QT interval, so that when they are prescribed with methadone, patients are theoretically placed at increased risk of a potentially fatal heart arrhythmia. Relatively common drugs like citalopram (Celexa), erythromycin, and cipro can cause QT interval prolongation.

How can a doctor know about the ways drugs interact with methadone? Most of the main drugs, like sedatives, methadone inducers and inhibitors, we know off the top of our heads, but technology gives us many ways to augment our brain power. Doctors can reference one of the three or four free smart phone apps. These are particularly helpful with the QT interval prolongers, since that list is very long and frequently changing.

Now for the hardest part: what should a doctor to do when a patient gets a medication that can interact with methadone? I’ve scoured the internet, and there are no easy answers. The Addiction Treatment Forum, has published some general guidelines that seem prudent: http://www.atforum.com/pdf/Drug_Interactions.pdf

As the AT Forum points out, just because an interaction may occur doesn’t mean it will occur. Certainly we should notify the patient of possible drug interactions and ask them to report any sedation or withdrawal while they are taking the new medication so that we can adjust the methadone dose accordingly. If the new medication is only prescribed for a week or two, the patient may not need a dose adjustment.

We may recommend getting an EKG if the new medication is known to prolong the QT interval. It’s nice if that can be done at the opioid treatment program, but OTPs may not be doing regular screening, especially after the Cochrane report of 2013 called routine EKG screening of methadone patients into question. (See my blog post of 9/19/13)

Should an EKG be done? Who should do it? What should we do if the QT interval is prolonged? If the second medication is essential to treat a serious ailment, should the patient’s methadone dose be reduced? Should that patient switch to buprenorphine? Is the risk of partially treated opioid addiction potentially more harmful to the patient than the other serious ailment for which the patient is being treated?

I don’t know the answers and I can’t find anyone else who can give me solid answers about what to do in cases where my patients are prescribed other medications that interact with methadone. For now, I am taking what I feel are prudent precautions, and trying hard not to over-react and pull a patient off methadone, since I know for sure methadone is live-saving. It’s important to remember that just because an interaction is possible doesn’t mean it will happen.

If another doctor prescribes a medication short-term that may interact with methadone, I want the patient to be informed of a possible reaction. I may, with the patient’s permission, call the doctor to ask them if it can be changed to a safer medication, or I may ask the nurses to check with the patient about sedation or withdrawal each day when they come in to dose. Sometimes I’ve asked patients on higher take home levels to come to the OTP more often for closer monitoring until we see the full effects of a new medication, then return them to their usual take home status.

Patients need to tell us when they stop medications, too. I had one patient who was on phenytoin (Dilantin) for the treatment of seizures. Since this medication induces methadone metabolism and drops the serum methadone level, I had increased the patient’s dose of methadone to keep him out of withdrawal. But then, deciding he no longer needed to take phenytoin, he suddenly stopped it and became sedated. Thankfully he reported his sedation to the nurses and we quickly figured out what had happened. His dose had to be lowered quite a bit to prevent overdose, since off phenytoin, his blood level of methadone apparently rose abruptly.

At one of the OTPs where I work, I can easily get an EKG to monitor the QT interval. At the other, I have to ask the other doctor to check and EKG. Particularly with psychiatric medications, this creates difficulties, since psychiatrists usually don’t do EKGs in their offices. The patient has to be referred to a third facility if I feel an EKG is essential. This can become expensive to a patient without insurance, so it’s better if the doctor prescribes a medication that doesn’t affect the QT interval, if possible.

As time goes on, I think we’ll get more information about medication interactions with methadone, and I’d like to see more specific guidelines about how to handle potential

Methadone Dosing: Use the Evidence

methadone

The most successful opioid treatment programs and the most successful patients in those programs use evidence-based dosing of methadone. Many studies over the last 40 years show patients do better on adequate doses of methadone. They have better outcomes when they’re on enough methadone to block physical withdrawal signs and symptoms than when they’re on insufficient doses.

In the past, methadone clinics often had dose caps. Some clinics told their patients they didn’t need any more than 60 or 70mg of methadone per day. But over the last 40 years, we have multiple studies showing poorer outcomes at clinics with these low dose caps, as opposed to individualized dose determination. Numerous studies show higher drop-out rates in patients on doses less than 60mg, as well as more illicit opioid use and higher rates of HIV infection, as compared to patients on 100mg or more. For most patients, the blocking effect is seen in the neighborhood of 80 to 120mg of methadone per day. (In Tennessee, there are still dose caps. In that state, doctors have to get approval from a non-physician at the state’s Department of Mental Health to take a patient’s dose above 120mg.)

Patients vary widely the way they metabolize methadone. A patient with slow methadone metabolism may do best on 30mg of methadone per day, and a fast metabolizer may need much more than 120mg per day. This rate of methadone metabolism is probably determined by our genetics. When patients ask me how much methadone they should be taking, my answer is, “Enough.” I’m not advocating taking doses higher than they need to be, but if the patient looks like they’re in withdrawal, and they feel like they’re in withdrawal, it’s best to take the dose up. We want to use the lowest effective dose.
There are still misguided opioid treatment programs that try to keep methadone doses low. Sometimes clinic staff can send shaming verbal or nonverbal messages, and imply patients who ask for an increase in their dose are somehow trying to get one over on the clinic. Staff shouldn’t shame patients who ask for a dose increase; staff should defer decisions about methadone dosing to their medical personnel.

Sometimes patients don’t want to increase their dose of methadone because they have mixed feelings about their treatment. If they feel guilty about being in a methadone program, they may want to keep their dose low. Sometimes family members, with the best of intentions, will demand the patient stay on a low dose, not understanding that their loved one is less likely to do well on an inadequate dose.

Frequently I see patients who are feeling bad, not sleeping, and achy all over in the mornings, and dosing at 40mg. I ask them if we can increase their dose, and they say something like, “No, I promised myself I wouldn’t go higher than 40mg.” Too often, patients don’t increase their dose for fear that coming off methadone will be harder to do at higher doses. This may be partly true. It may not be harder to come off of, but it take longer to taper off a higher dose. But the patient won’t do as well while they’re in treatment, so what’s the point?

Some patients prefer low doses because they want to have just enough methadone per day to keep them out of terrible opioid withdrawal, but not so much to block the euphoria they get from using an illicit opioid later in the day.
I tell patients that methadone is a little like chemotherapy. For chemo to work, you have to take a big enough dose to do the job. It’s the same way with methadone. It’s not a perfect analogy but patients get what I’m saying.

Let’s turn to the other side of dosing. I’ve seen some clinics with many patients on what I would consider very high methadone dosing. It’s hard to criticize, because I do think there are some patients who need doses higher than 250mg, particularly if they’re on certain medications, or are pregnant. But that’s rare, and at some clinics, many patients seem to be on these big doses. Since these patients have their dose increased slowly, they build a tolerance to the methadone, so such patients aren’t sedated. There’s no long-term damage to the body with very high dose methadone, but higher doses can cause some problems.

It may be hard for a patient on a very high dose to transfer to another clinic. Some methadone clinic medical directors are hesitant to accept a patient in transfer if they’re on 200-plus milligrams of methadone, unless there’s evidence that this dose is required. For example, I was looking over the records of a patient on 290mg, in preparation for transfer. This man was on no other medications and otherwise healthy. When I saw the peak and trough data, I was puzzled, because they were both high, and this was done at 200mg of methadone. So why was the patient taken to 290 milligrams? I know peak and trough levels aren’t the only factor to be considered when determining the right methadone dose, but there was scant information about why the doctor decided to raise the dose, or even if the patient had even seen the doctor recently. I wasn’t particularly concerned the patient would be sedated, because the dose had been raised slowly, over months. But I was concerned that the patient was on more methadone than he needed, especially since many of the patients at this clinic were on doses of more than 200mg per day.

Some studies have shown higher doses of methadone affect the way electrical impulses are transmitted through the heart. In some studies, higher methadone doses are more likely to produce prolongation of the QT interval than lower doses. (2) This QT prolongation does put patients at risk for a potentially fatal heart rhythm problem. The medical literature at present suggests that periodic EKG screening of patients on doses above 100mg is probably a good idea, but there’s still disagreement on this issue.

There is another factor to be considered. This may offend some readers, but we need to acknowledge the nature of addiction. It’s a disease who tells its sufferers, “More is better!” I think it’s important to acknowledge this point, and discuss it openly, but not in a shaming way. This psychological part of addiction doesn’t always go away within the first few weeks.
My approach to a patient on a relatively high dose, who desires an increase in methadone, is to meet with the patient, preferable prior to dosing. Sometimes I like to meet the patient two hours post-dose if I’m worried about sedation. I ask about withdrawal symptoms and check for pupil size and reaction, and other signs. I check the last drug screen. If the patient doesn’t describe withdrawal symptoms, and I don’t see objective signs of withdrawal, I’ll ask the patient how they expect to feel on an ideal dose of methadone, and if it’s possible their addiction is driving the desire to increase. I’m surprised that most patients aren’t offended, but welcome the opportunity to talk openly. Some patients say they honestly can’t tell if they are in withdrawal, or if their addiction tells them they are in withdrawal. My job is to help decide which it is.

Some patients feel “high” for the first few days after a dose increase, but tolerance builds quickly to this feeling. Some patients mistakenly believe they should always get that high after dosing. If the addiction is driving the patient’s way of thinking, the dose may never be “enough.” When I explain this to patients, most understand.

1. http://international.drugabuse.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/methadoneresearchwebguide.pdf
2. Krantz, Lewkowlez, Hays, et.al., “Torsade de Pointes Associated with Very-High Dose Methadone, Annals of Internal Medicine, Sept. 17, 2002, Vol 137(6) pp 501-505.

Methadone Dosing in Opioid Treatment Programs: Use the Evidence

The most successful opioid treatment programs and the most successful patients in those programs use evidence-based dosing of methadone. Many studies over the last 40 years show patients do better on adequate doses of methadone. They have better outcomes when they’re on enough methadone to block physical withdrawal signs and symptoms than when they’re on insufficient doses.

In the past, methadone clinics often had dose caps. Some clinics told their patients they didn’t need any more than 60 or 70mg of methadone per day.  But over the last 40 years, we have multiple studies showing poorer outcomes at clinics with these low dose caps, as opposed to individualized dose determination. Numerous studies show higher drop-out rates in patients on doses less than 60mg, as well as more illicit opioid use and higher rates of HIV infection, as compared to patients on 100mg or more. For most patients, the blocking effect is seen in the neighborhood of 80 to 120mg of methadone per day.

However, there’s a great deal of difference between how patients metabolize methadone. A patient with slow methadone metabolism may do best on 30mg of methadone per day, and a fast metabolizer may need much more than 120mg per day. This rate of methadone metabolism is probably determined by our genetics. When patients ask me how much methadone they should be taking, my answer is, “Enough.” I’m not advocating taking doses higher than they need to be, but if the patient looks like they’re in withdrawal, and they feel like they’re in withdrawal, it’s best to take the dose up. We want to use the lowest effective dose.                                                                                                                                 

There are still misguided opioid treatment programs that try to keep methadone doses low. Sometimes clinic staff can send shaming verbal or nonverbal messages, and imply patients who ask for an increase in their dose are somehow trying to get one over on the clinic. Staff shouldn’t shame patients who ask for a dose increase; staff should defer decisions about methadone dosing to their medical personnel.

Sometimes patients don’t want to increase their dose of methadone because they have mixed feelings about their treatment. If they feel guilty about being in a methadone program, they may want to keep their dose low. Sometimes family members, with the best of intentions, will demand the patient stay on a low dose, not understanding that their loved one is less likely to do well on an inadequate dose.

Frequently I see patients who are feeling bad, not sleeping, and achy all over in the mornings, and dosing at 40mg. I ask them if we can increase their dose, and they say something like, “No, I promised myself I wouldn’t go higher than 40mg.” Too often, patients don’t increase their dose for fear that coming off methadone will be harder to do at higher doses. This is partly true. It may not be harder to come off of, but it does take longer to taper off a higher dose. But the patient won’t do as well while they’re in treatment, so what’s the point?

Some patients prefer low doses because they want to have just enough methadone per day to keep them out of terrible opioid withdrawal, but not so much to block the euphoria they get from using an illicit opioid later in the day.

I tell patients that methadone is a little like chemotherapy. For chemo to work, you have to take a big enough dose to do the job. It’s the same way with methadone. It’s not a perfect analogy but patients get what I’m saying.

Let’s turn to the other side of dosing. I’ve seen some clinics with many patients on what I would consider very high methadone dosing. It’s hard to criticize, because I do think there are some patients who need doses higher than 250mg, particularly if they’re on certain medications, or are pregnant. But that’s rare, and at some clinics, many patients seem to be on these big doses. Since these patients have their dose increased slowly, they build a tolerance to the methadone, so such patients aren’t sedated. There’s no long-term damage to the body with very high dose methadone, but higher doses can cause some problems.

It may be hard for a patient on a very high dose to transfer to another clinic. Some methadone clinic medical directors are hesitant to accept a patient in transfer if they’re on 200-plus milligrams of methadone, unless there’s evidence that this dose is required. For example, I was looking over the records of a patient on 290mg, in preparation for transfer. This man was on no other medications and otherwise healthy. When I saw the peak and trough data, I was puzzled, because they were both high, and this was done at 200mg of methadone. So why was the patient taken to 290 milligrams? I know peak and trough levels aren’t the only factor to be considered when determining the right methadone dose, but there was scant information about why the doctor decided to raise the dose, or even if the patient had even seen the doctor recently. I wasn’t particularly concerned the patient would be sedated, because the dose had been raised slowly, over months. But I was concerned that the patient was on more methadone than he needed, especially since many of the patients at this clinic were on doses of more than 200mg per day.

Some studies have shown higher doses of methadone affect the way electrical impulses are transmitted through the heart. In some studies, higher methadone doses are more likely to produce prolongation of the QT interval than lower doses. (2) This QT prolongation does put patients at risk for a potentially fatal heart rhythm problem. The medical literature at present suggests that periodic EKG screening of patients on doses above 100mg is probably a good idea, but there’s still disagreement on this issue.

There is another factor to be considered. This may offend some readers, but we need to acknowledge the nature of addiction. It’s a disease who tells its sufferers, “More is better!”  I think it’s important to acknowledge this point, and discuss it openly, but not in a shaming way. This psychological part of addiction doesn’t always go away within the first few weeks.

My approach to a patient on a relatively high dose, who desires an increase in methadone, is to meet with the patient, preferable prior to dosing. Sometimes I like to meet the patient two hours post-dose if I’m worried about sedation. I ask about withdrawal symptoms and check for pupil size and reaction, and other signs. I check the last drug screen. If the patient doesn’t describe withdrawal symptoms, and I don’t see objective signs of withdrawal, I’ll ask the patient how they expect to feel on an ideal dose of methadone, and if it’s possible their addiction is driving the desire to increase. I’m surprised that most patients aren’t offended, but welcome the opportunity to talk openly. Some patients say they honestly can’t tell if they are in withdrawal, or if their addiction tells them they are in withdrawal. My job is to help decide which it is.

Some patients feel “high” for the first few days after a dose increase, but tolerance builds quickly to this feeling. Some patients mistakenly believe they should always get that high after dosing. If the addiction is driving the patient’s way of thinking, the dose may never be “enough.” When I explain this to patients, most understand.

I could be wrong, but I have an impression that very high doses are seen more frequently in patients enrolled in large, for-profit methadone clinic chains, with numerous facilities scattered across the country. I wonder if the doctors working there talk often with their patients, examine them, and talk about their symptoms and expectations.

I’d like to hear feedback from patients at opioid treatment centers. What do you think? Are clinic doctors too reluctant to order dose increases? Or too quick to increase doses, without talking to the patient?

 

1. http://international.drugabuse.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/methadoneresearchwebguide.pdf

      2. Krantz, Lewkowlez, Hays, et.al., “Torsade de Pointes Associated with Very-High Dose Methadone, Annals of Internal Medicine, Sept. 17, 2002, Vol 137(6) pp 501-505.