How to get drug misusers to adhere to your treatment

In treating opioid use disorder, especially relating to heroin, the trick is not necessarily finding the treatment that works best pharmacologically but the one to which patients will adhere.

That’s the main rationale behind long-term subcutaneous buprenorphine, which can be administered weekly or monthly by a doctor rather than relying on patients to take a daily oral dose.

The first such product to the market in Australia, Buvidal, was approved by the TGA in November last year.

And, last month, the results of a phase III trial