1st Edition

Pharmacotherapies for the Treatment of Opioid Dependence Efficacy, Cost-Effectiveness and Implementation Guidelines

Edited By Richard P. Mattick, Robert Ali, Nicholas Lintzeris Copyright 2009
    520 Pages
    by CRC Press

    The most comprehensive text of its kind, this book addresses both the management of opioid withdrawal and opioid maintenance therapy, and combines up-to-date reviews of the scientific literature with evidence-based clinical guidelines for all of the relevant pharmacotherapies.

    A unique work, Pharmacotherapies for the Treatment of Opioid Dependence presents:

    ·        detailed information on the cost-effectiveness of the various types of opioid treatment

    ·        the range of pharmacotherapies used for the management of opioid dependence

    ·        the state of knowledge from the international research literature on the value and relative efficacy of the various pharmacological approaches.

    This includes pharmacotherapies used in the management of withdrawal from opioids such as clonidine, lofexidine, methadone, buprenorphine and naltrexone and also symptomatic medications. It also includes different forms of maintenance therapy using opioid agonists such as methadone, LAAM, buprenorphine, slow-release oral morphine and diamorphine, and opioid antagonists such as naltrexone.

    This text should appeal to researchers, to identify gaps in the research literature and provide a basis for determining appropriate research directions, to clinicians by providing clinical with clinical guidelines and information concerning the empirical basis for the treatments, and to policy makers in assisting them to make decisions about the various treatments from a public health perspective, taking into account the relative cost and effectiveness of the interventions.

    Opioid dependence and management
    Pharmacology of opioid agonists and antagonists
    Services for heroin withdrawal: A review
    Methadone maintenance treatment
    LAAM in the treatment of opioid dependence: A systematic review
    The place of buprenorphine in the management of opioid dependence
    Treating heroin dependence with diamorphine (pharmaceutical heroin)
    Naltrexone maintenance treatment
    Pharmacotherapies and pregnancy
    Politics, practice, and research into treatment of heroin addiction
    Clinical guidelines and procedures for the use of methadone in the maintenance treatment of opioid dependence
    National clinical guidelines and procedures for the use of buprenorphine in the treatment of heroin dependence
    Clinical guidelines and procedures for the use of naltrexone in the management of opioid dependence
    Choosing treatments: The role of economics in informing future decisions

    Biography

    Richard P. Mattick, Robert Ali, Nicholas Lintzeris

    "This succinct, well-organized book covers the relevant issues clinicians may need to address in treating patients for opiate withdrawal.  It can be very useful for all healthcare providers involved in the clinical treatment of this patient population."

    Michael Easton, MD - Rush University Medical Center (Doody Review, August 09)

    "What the present book usefully adds to its predecessors are clinical guidelines for the use of opioid pharmacotherapies and a discussion of the cost-effectiveness of opioid therapies, helping the reader to make some assessment of the relative inexpensiveness of these therapies compared to other interventions and treatments in other settings.

    I can see this will be a valuable book for clinicians and researchers who need a quick but reassuringly balanced and informed entry into the now extensive research supporting opioid prescribing. Busy policymakers may also find much of use in the book, if they have the time and the open mind to read it."

    John Witton - National Addiction Centre, Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London (Reviewed in Druscope's journal, Druglink July 09)