HARCP Archives

Browse by article

Browse by volume

Heroin Addiction and Related Clinical Problems: 2008, 10, 3 (pages: 33 - 36)

Finnish Experience With Buprenorphine-Naloxone Combination (Suboxone®): Survey Evaluations With Intravenous Drug Users

Simojoki K., Alho A.

Summary: Finland, with a population of around 5.5 million, has four years of prescribing a buprenorphine-naloxone combination product (bup/nx) under its belt, and it already has the most bup/nx experience within Europe. Our data show that the decision to transfer patients from buprenorphine to bup/nx more than halved the street value of an 8 mg tablet, in a country where buprenorphine had previously been the most widely intravenously-abused drug. Patients are now maintained on an average daily dose of 16 mg bup/nx and, reassuringly, buprenorphine misuse is decreasing. Most importantly, the pre-buprenorphine heroin mortality figures have all but vanished: from 63 deaths in 2000, in the last few years Finland has seen heroin claim just 0 - 4 lives per annum.