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In a unanimous vote last week, Congress approved a bill that willmake addiction treatment accessible to more people across the U.S.
The bill raises the number of people a doctor can treat withbuprenorphine, a medication approved by the FDA to treat opioidaddiction. Buprenorphine is administered orally, and, unlike methadone,it does not require regular visits to a clinic.
until now, the number of people with access to buprenorphine hasbeen severely limited by the fact that doctors could only prescribe itfor up to 30 patients at a time. In fact, until last year, this 30patient limit applied to entire group practices, not just individualdoctors.
Last week's vote improves the situation by raising the cap to 100patients per doctor. However, there are still formidable barriers tobuprenorphine access. With the new bill, the patient limit only movesto 100 after a doctor has been prescribing buprenorphine for one year.In addition, many doctors do not prescribe buprenorphine because doingso requires a special certification.
Bill Piper, DPA's director of national affairs, said, "It's a stepin the right direction, but they keep making these incremental changes.It would be better to just do it right the first time and give peopleaccess to the treatment they need."
http://www.nooked.com/news/itemtrack...0f87edefaa2291

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jasmine_07

This will definitely help a lot of addicts.
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jasmine_07
Drug Rehab Program --Know more about addiction treatments