I have been on subs twice: once in 2010 for 5 months and once again in 2012 for 2 months and now I've been on methadone since late 2012, but that's all about to change. I've been decreasing my methadone and am either going to some fancy shmamcy rapid detox (they put you under anesthesia for a while and administer IV naloxone and naltrexone at the same time, then put you on a drip of Ativan after for recovery, and out the door you go on Vivitrol pills or shot after just 72 hrs...dream procedure but incredibly expensive) OR I'll be getting back on bupe maintenance. Methadone is costing me (between dosing, transportation, fuel, etc.) about $6k-7k annually. It's insane.
Now, once going to subs, I can get any amount of strips and my insurance will only make me pay $110 maximum. Basically anything over 10-15 strips costs the max and under ends up being expensive like 80 bucks or something for 11 strips. They have a once a month discount card you can use that's good for $50, so that gives me one script of subs per month at $60. Great... I used to get #120 of suboxone tablets for only 60 monthly, back in 2010.
Same insurance, but rates change, etc. Plus suboxone tabs are gone and films have added two new dosage strengths. Any way you cut it (30x12mg, 60x8mg, 90x4mg), subs will end up costing me $60 after discount, and that's assuming I get a SINGLE monthly script. My last sub doc had me on weekly scripts for a month, then twice a month, then finally monthly, so the discount card was only good for the first fill of the month. Not to mention, a prior authorization by my insurance to even fill the shit, literally ONLY this medicine.
I checked into zubsolv with my insurance and no prior auth is required, plus the max price is $75, no matter how many tabs. And zubsolv's $75 discount card online printoff is good for EVERY fill, so if I needed 5.7mg twice or thrice a day, it'll be entirely free. Every time.
Final Question: to those of you on Zub, did your doctor(s) take easily to writing the RX out for zubsolv instead of suboxone? The doc I'm going to (like most) is specifically listed as offering a "Suboxone Program" even though technically their license allows them to prescribe subutex, suboxone, generics of each of the latter, as WELL as Zubsolv, which my doc may not have heard of and will get scared and say no. When clearly it would save me $300+ monthly by being on that over subs.
Additionally: how do the generic sub tablets taste? My maximum copay on those is only $7 a month so I would be golden with those as well, considering they're not absolutely worthless like the suboxone SL tablets.