Policy progress for physician treatment of opiate addiction

Medical treatment of heroin addiction with methadone and other pharmacotherapies has important benefits for individuals and society. However, regulatory policies have separated this treatment from the medical care system, limiting access to care and contributing to the social stigma of even effective addiction pharmacotherapy. Increasing problems caused by heroin addiction have added urgency to the search for policies and programs that improve the access to and quality of opiate addiction treatment. Recent initiatives aiming to reintegrate methadone maintenance and other addiction pharmacotherapies into medical practice may promote both expanded treatment capacity and increased physician expertise in addiction medicine. These initiatives include changes in federal oversight of the opiate addiction treatment system, the approval of physician office-based methadone maintenance programs for stabilized patients, and federal legislation that could enable physicians to treat opiate addiction with new medications in regular medical practice. This work was assisted by a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Substance Abuse Policy Research Program.