Whether you’ve already tried to quit using opioids or you can’t even imagine trying to stop, you understand that early recovery can be a difficult time, to say the least. Unfortunately, between the withdrawal symptoms and the incessant cravings, people often wind up using again just to find some relief. This is exactly where Suboxone® can help.
As addiction specialists, our team here at Northshore Family Practice wants to provide our clients with every tool available to increase their chances of success. While breaking an addiction and recovering require multiple tools, Suboxone can play a key role.
Here’s a look at how Suboxone works to help you break free from your opioid addiction.
While it may seem counterintuitive, the use of medications to help you overcome drug or alcohol withdrawal and addiction can be very helpful. Called medication-assisted treatment (MAT), the use of medications is designed to ease both the withdrawal symptoms and the ongoing cravings in early recovery.
Whether you’ve already tried to quit on your own or you’ve heard some unfavorable stories, you know that, time and again, the combined power of withdrawal symptoms and cravings often sends people back to using to relieve the discomfort.
When this happens, many people tend to overdo usage, putting them at serious risk for overdose. With MAT, studies show that medications like Suboxone lower the risk of fatal overdose by 50%.
If you’re trying to overcome an opioid addiction, Suboxone contains two ingredients that approach the problem from two different angles:
The first active ingredient in Suboxone is buprenorphine, which is a partial opioid agonist. Buprenorphine attaches to the opioid receptors in your body, much like heroin or other opioids do. But as a partial agonist only, it doesn’t deliver the same “high.” Not only can this ingredient help wean you off of full agonist opioids, it helps to reduce withdrawal symptoms and cravings that are associated with early recovery.
The second key ingredient in Suboxone is naloxone, which is a pure opioid antagonist. The role of naloxone is to shut down your receptors to prevent them from being activated.
When combined, these two ingredients work together to “satisfy” any cravings you may develop and greatly reduce your withdrawal symptoms, all while preventing you from feeling the euphoric effects of the opioids.
There is a small risk of developing an addiction to Suboxone, which is why we closely monitor your use of the medication as you negotiate early recovery.
If you’re sick and tired of being sick and tired due to your opioid use disorder, contact our office in Bothell, Washington, to see whether Suboxone may hold the key to getting your life back.
