What is Buprenorphine All About?
What Is Buprenorphine
If you are looking for an answer to the question, what is Buprenorphine? Here is a brief explanation:
Buprenorphine is the generic form of Suboxone. It acts like a partial agonist and an antagonist to the mu and the kappa opioid receptors, respectively. Thus like any other opioid drug, it can cause respiratory depression or euphoria. Since it is a partial agonist, you cannot expect its maximum effect to be as potent as the Methadone or Heroin. Thus, when you use the Buprenorphine at a very low dosage, it exhibits agonist effects. Hence Buprenorphine therapy can be used for those who have addiction towards opioids. If you understand, what is Buprenorphine? , then it will help you to discontinue the opioid addiction.
What is Buprenorphine ceiling effect? As you increase the dosage of Buprenorphine, the effects are linearly increased. But when the moderate dosage is reached, you cannot expect to get an increase in opioid effect, at doses higher than this. A plateau or ceiling effect will thus be reached. This is one of the primary reasons, why Buprenorphine can be safely used to treat opioid addiction. In other words, even at higher doses, Buprenorphine will have less a risk of addiction or side effects. On the contrary, when other opioid agonists like morphine are administered in large doses, it can lead to fatal effects as with oxycontin overdose.
What Is Buprenorphine : Side Effects
It might have mild side effects like vomiting, nausea or even constipation. But apart from this, research has shown that there is no serious damage to any of your internal or the external organs. Due to the chronic usage of Buprenorphine, you need not fear that your cognitive performance will get affected. There will be no hindrance to both your cognitive performance as well as your psychomotor performance, due to the high dosage. The only effect that can be seen, due to usage of Buprenorphine for a long time, is a large increase in the liver enzymes. What is Buprenorphine and the effect of its maximum dosage? When you consume 16 to 32 mg of Buprenorphine, you can expect a maximum plateau effect. Thus understanding, what is Buprenorphine is extremely important for opioid addicted patients.
What I Buprenorphine Used For?
What is Buprenorphine monotherapy? In the year 2002, FDA approved this Buprenorphine therapy. It can be used as a monotherapy product, which is called Subutex. What is Buprenorphine combination product called? Buprenorphine can be given as a combination product called Suboxone (mixture of Buprenorphine and naloxone). The good news is that both these forms have been approved by Food and Drug Administration. But Buprenex, a Buprenorphine form is not approved by FDA. From the FDA site, you can understand what is Buprenorphine and the generic form. Since it has less oral bioavailability, it is administered in the form of sublingual tablet. For instance, you can take a Suboxone tablet that contains 2 mg Buprenorphine and 0.5 mg of Naloxone or the Subutex tablet that contains either 2 or 8 mg of Buprenorphine, depending on the safe limits prescribed or recommended by doctors.
If you do not wish to get any side effects, both physicians and patients must understand, what is Buprenorphine and its safe dosage. The total half life of Buprenorphine is 60 hours at the maximum. It will get metabolized into norbuprenorphine in liver with the help of the enzyme called Cytochrome P4503A4. It has got a very high affinity to the plasma proteins. What is Buprenorphine and its role in a combination tablet?
The sublingual route is considered to be the best route, when administering Buprenorphine as a combination product. This is due to the fact that it has a good bioavailability in this route. At the same time, Naloxone has got a poor bioavailability in this route. It implies that the effect of Buprenorphine will dominate the effects of naloxone, in the sublingual route. On the contrary, if you crush the combined tablet and inject it to an opioid addict, the effect of Naloxone dominates Buprenorphine and it might lead to opioid withdrawal symptom.
Those who can take up this treatment include patients, who are diagnosed with opioid addiction (painkiller addiction) and those who are voluntarily willing to undergo this treatment. They must not have any past histories that show the allergic reaction towards Buprenorphine.
What Is Buprenorphine Treatment Like?
In any type of Buprenorphine therapy, you might expect the 3 different stages. First is the induction phase. This is followed by the stabilization and maintenance phases. When the opioid addicted person has stopped using them for more than a day, he is said to be in the early stage of withdrawal. At this juncture, Buprenorphine can be administered. The dosage of the drug will be reduced in each phase. For instance, in the stabilization phase, the patient has actually been abstained from taking opioids for a long time. He no longer has any type of craving for opioids. The patient actually experiences lesser amount of side effects at this stabilization stage. There is another advantage of suing the drug at this stage. Buprenorphine has got a very long half life. Thus the effect of the drug stays in the body for a long time and hence it can be administered on the alternate days. More on Buprenorphine Treatment and Suboxone Treatment.
The duration for each phase will differ from one patient to another. Thus the dosage administered to each and every patient will also be different to a certain extent. When the patient is able to live well at a steady and a regular dose of Buprenorphine, he is said to be in the maintenance phase.
More Information On What Is Buprenorphine
Drugs.com: Buprenorphine Injection
Find Professional Help With Opioid Addiction
Use our FREE services to find help. We have three directories: a Suboxone Dr Directory, Methadone Treatment Clinics Directory, and Oxycontin Treatment Directory. These list will help you find drug addiction treatment in your area. Dr. Rich has more articles on drug addiction including: The Real Suboxone Cost and and Understanding What Is Methadone?
