Methadone Regulations: Keeping Your Take-Home Doses Safe
Methadone Regulations: Keeping Your Take-Home Doses Safe
Methadone clinics like CATC clinics have to meet the ever-changing federal requirements for dispensing prescription methadone and treating opioid addictions. Patients also have some rules to follow, but one of the most important is to keep the prescription methadone safe and secure.
There are strict rules for methadone clinic regarding take-home medications. In the first few months, patients are only given one dose to take home. After they have proven to be dedicated to getting healthy, the clinics are able to increase the take-home dosages. Eventually, patients are actually able to take home a monthly supply.
Methadone Lock-Boxes
As more responsibility is given to patients who are winning the battle against opioid addiction, it is important that those take-home doses are kept safely locked up, away from the interested eyes and fingers of anyone who could get into the dosages. This means that you will need to get a lock box.
Each clinic will require that you bring the lock box when you receive your take-homes. You must put the take homes into the lock box to take the medication out of the clinic. If you are at a clinic that does not require a lock box for bringing medication home, it is in your best interest to just do it on your own.
When you get your medication home, it is a good idea to put the lock box in a safe place. Whether you have children at home or you know people who are aware that you are taking methadone, you should hide that box like your life depended on it. There have been children who have taken their parents’ dosages and they have died. No parent wants to see this happen – so keeping methadone locked up safely cannot be stressed enough.
Since methadone is already controversial on its own, the last thing that the helpful treatment therapy needs is more opportunities for critics to find more faults. It also allows people to criticize those who take methadone as a therapy. But, we know that the majority of people who are on a methadone treatment program are not menaces to society – in fact, they are quite the opposite.
Dangers of Methadone Misuse
Deaths do not just occur with misuses of methadone, but also with other prescription opioids like buprenorphine, naloxone, and Oxycontin. In order to prevent accidents, patients need to be educated appropriately by their clinics and pharmacists. It is also important that the family members of those working to fight their addictions need to understand safety measures.
The danger with methadone is not that the high increases with taking a higher dosage; the trouble comes with the fact that methadone becomes dangerous as it creates problems with the heart rate and with breathing. The other danger with the drug is that even a minimal dose can cause respiratory distress, especially if the person who takes the dose does not have any tolerance to opioids. Respiratory distress can lead to death.
Even if you do not have children in your home, it is still a good idea to always keep your medication locked up and stowed safely away. It is better safe than sorry.
Take-Methadone Dose Safety
Here are a few rules to abide by:
- Never keep the key in the lock box.
- Keep the lock box out of reach of children.
- Take the medication as prescribed and then put it away.
- Never leave out an open bottle of methadone – even if you have to do something quickly.
- Rinse out the cup that you use to drink your methadone.
- Return empty bottles of methadone in the lock box. Do not just throw them away.
- Do not put methadone in bottles other than their original ones.
- Talk to your family about the dangers of your medication
Get Help From Canadian Addiction Treatment Centres
With patient-centered treatment, addiction can be stopped. At Canadian Addiction Treatment Centers, we help people struggling with addiction work their way back to a healthy, addiction-free lifestyle. Get help today by filling out our contact form or giving us a call at 1-877-937-2282.