Advice on holiday script

[misgog]

Tabs are preferable but you can take unlimited oral fluid through security with proof it is medically prescribed, we had to clarify this in the summer when there was a tablet shortage 

[Prun]

Yes agree tabs are more convenient, and less likely to spill and be wasted. We do that as the norm for people now.

[sapphire]

You cannot take unlimited meds ín your carry on luggage.

The only way you can take more than 100ml in your carry on is if you have a doctor's note stating that you need ALL the medication for use DURING the course of the flight.

Please do not rock up to the airport with 500/1000ml or whatever of meds and expect them to allow you to keep it in your handluggage.

Some other countries can be different, but if you're flying on an international flight out of the UK, that is what most airlines will expect of you.

Just check before you actually need to order your holiday script etc. If you're flying, pills are often better.

[OP8S]

Absolutely, especially in the increasingly dark world of opioiphobic official job'sworths. If travelling abroad you're as well asking your GP or DSP to provide a letter stating any O.S.T. or opioid pain relief just to be on the safe side. It won't only ruin your own holiday if you're dragged in at customs then sent on the next plane home but also any friends or family who might be accompanying you.
If you have a letter with a contact number on it, you'll be able to relax before you even get there. Because of the rush & carry on trying to get tablets ( got them the night before & cleaned the pharmacy out of their stock as they didn't know to get them in for me ) I didn't have a letter. Imagine the look on my kid's faces (8 & 7 at that time ) if I'd been deported from the country where Santa lives!
As it was we were so far North that they didn't even have a proper airport just a hanger, a tractor with a trailer for hold luggage & one customs official stamping passports. Passengers just sorted out there own luggage by eye. It could have been a different story completely though, you never know unless you've travelled to a particular destination or not what might be waiting for you at the other end.

Remember the woman who was locked up in Tunisia, Egypt(?) for " allegedly " carrying in Tramadol for her boyfriend's pain issues? Didn't go well for her, I do remember thinking that it was a shit load of tramadol at the time  & the story was rather sketchy. She said they'd been prescribed for her, if that was the case things may have been a lot different if she had a letter from the GP.
Always ask for a letter is the answer!

[sapphire]

Every time I travel I ALWAYS make sure I've got a letter from my prescriber with my medication name, the dosage and the contact numbers of the prescriber and the pharmacist.

You just CANNOT be too careful when travelling with opioids, and you don't want you're travels ruined for the sake of a little prior planning.

Plus, always be polite to the airline/airport staff. If you're rude/discourteous they can make your life so much more difficult. Manners cost nothing!!

[Odysseus]

Over they took Physeptone off the prescription list when they started to use 1mg\1ml so the only form available now is the 1mg1\ml liquid.  Patient's had no choice, even then you still some chemists dispening it in the 500ml glass bottles.  That's just asking for trouble. 

Thankfully no one does that now, but a weekly take away for me is 770m that is a lot of liquid to carry around, but if it is the only option what do you do!

[sapphire]

You can't get methadone tablets/physeptone over there now?

We cannot get them easily, in a lot of places you have to show your DSP your travel documents before they'll prescribe them.

They also will sometimes prescribe them to pregnant women who have morning sickness that is being made worse by the smell/taste of methadone to the point that they cannot keep it down.

I used to get them for that reason. Not pregnant, but the smell and taste of green liquid made it impossible for me to keep it down. Then they put me on 10mg/1ml, which still smelled/tasted bad, but as it was a much smaller amount, it was bearable

[OP8S]

Really wish the UK would get with the times & get 20-40mg tabs for some. I was splitting my dose while I was working over Xmas to help with pain & carrying around a bottle of meth in a new job with no lockers, no privacy was a real pain in the arse ( no pun intended )

[misgog]

You cannot take unlimited meds ín your carry on luggage.

The only way you can take more than 100ml in your carry on is if you have a doctor's note stating that you need ALL the medication for use DURING the course of the flight.

Please do not rock up to the airport with 500/1000ml or whatever of meds and expect them to allow you to keep it in your handluggage.

Some other countries can be different, but if you're flying on an international flight out of the UK, that is what most airlines will expect of you.

Just check before you actually need to order your holiday script etc. If you're flying, pills are often better.

Not sure if I was clear, we contacted the Home Office and asked the specific question of "If someone can prove they are legitimately prescribed medication in liquid form over the 100 ml limit, would they be able to travel" and the answer was yes, similarly if someone required liquid fees etc they can take excess fluids. Numerous service users went abroad with 1000ml + Methadone in hand luggage without issue. Tabs are very much preferable if available

[Odysseus]

Really wish the UK would get with the times & get 20-40mg tabs for some. I was splitting my dose while I was working over Xmas to help with pain & carrying around a bottle of meth in a new job with no lockers, no privacy was a real pain in the arse ( no pun intended )

I haven't seen a physeptone tab since 1996, at that time they drew up a treatment protocol that only allowed GP's who undertook specific training or those who working within the Health Service treatment units.  It was at this time they introduced the 1m/1mg formula and took the 2mg/5ml off the medication list.  The clinics very occasionally use 10mg/1ml but it will never be given as a take away.

The set up the usual type of Central Treatment List, if the patient was suited for treatment in the community they where assigned a specific doc and specific pharmacy where it would be dispensed.


At that time a lot of pharmacies wouldn't touch a methadone script, in order to get them and GP's on board they were to and still are paid twice the amount of a normal patient. 

It was strange how so many docs and pharmacist's suddenly had a moral about-turn in relation to methadone, it couldn't have been just the money as so many where again it. 

[OP8S]

It works when given in high enough doses, I'd think that money would of had a lot to do with it that & GP's getting sick of users coming in a couple of times a week after losing their palf prescribed for pain, or so they thought at first. No Dr's like to see their waiting rooms filled up with a bunch of loudmouth junkies.