Who me?-
Rosclot said he was strapped on cash and bupe wasn't a possibility, its a shame though as bupe is the better maintenence/detox drug IMO. Bupe will remain expensive unless the government does a hold on the price [which wont happen] or untill there patent expires [10 years]. With the cost of a 8mg tab being $5-7 [when bought in quantities over 30, more expensive when you are getting les than 30]. The usual heavy handed habit IME calls for 24-32mg a day thats still about $20/per day just for the meds, still cheaper than a daily habit but untill more health insurance companies start to cover it or they start to offer some sort of sliding scale/state funded payment options bupe will remain out of reach for most people that cant afford to drop that much cash.
Your right about looking around at different bupe doctors as there rates are not set in stone and vary a bit from office to office. Also some doctors are in it for the money duh... and they persist on many more office visits than neccesary. According to the SAMSHA guidlines though the prescribing doctor is supposed to conduct the induction phase that requires a bit more one-on-one consulations in the begining to make sure the drug is working correctly.
I did have a friend who had a monster habit, was low on cash and absolutely was not going back on the methadone wagon as he was previously on methadone and knows that clinics are more blood thirsty [read: money hungry groups that want nothing more for the client to become addicted to methadone and stay on methadone, its funny how they dont mention the insanely high failure rates for simplely getting off methadone not even counting the failure rates if the person can successfully get off and deal with the 2 month'ish w/d's that come with a year-multi-year habit.
Anyways the bupe doctor was able to work out some sort of payment plan with him so it would make getting through the first month alot less taxing.
In time bupe will become more accessable for innercity clincs and hopefully will surpass methadone in its scripts. Plus most Methadone doctors are really not allowed to work on other issues [dual-diagnosis patients] a client might be dealing with because methadone has a huge list of drugs that interact strongly with the meth. My doctor was just telling me that thats one of the reasons she prefers scripting bupe over meth [she does both] is because bupe is more of a one-on-one setting and the bupe allows for a much higer range in medication they can script to help patients with other disorders. When was the last time you saw a methadone doctor script: benzos, adderall, anti-d's and anti-p's along with the opiates? Not many, but in bupe its common.
Desea Vivo el Bupe...!
