Putting Full Recovery First

[sapphire]

I do think that the choice of methadone or buprenorphine is quite limiting, and perhaps treatment would be more successful with a wider variety of options.

The statistics that come from the old 'British System' of diamorphine prescribing are actually very good. The percentage of people leaving treatment drug free is far above what it is currently, or ever has been since the conception if methadone clinics in the UK.

[seven]

I had a friend many years ago who got diamorphine in ampules for injection and that worked for him. But the state needs to realise that people have used drugs for 1000s of years and they are not going to stop and are not victims...I hate the word "treatment" because I have no medical problem.
I hate to bring up alcohol again but it really is the only stick to hit "normal people" with.....ask someone who drinks if they are in "treatment" being allowed to buy their drug? I think they would say no.
I think there should be some sort of licencing system whereby you could go to the chemist and buy your drug but if you behave like a tool you have your licence taken away. It would make lives of NORMAL people like us much easier than to have to keep begging doctors who think they are gods.

[sapphire]

That's true, people have been trying to alter their reality through 'drugs' since time began, so people are quite arrogant really to think that they are the ones that are going to stop this!!

Some kind of licensing system would be a good idea, so a patient could go to the pharmacy to get diamorphine, for example.

Doctors that act like that when they know they have power over you because they dispense the medication that you are dependant on are fricking idiots and I hate them!! Luckily there are some decent ones out there.

[seven]

Well I guess they would say to you that alcohol is a legal substance that can be purchased at a super market, not a heavily controlled prescription only medication!

But I get your point, no one should ever be forced into treatment that they don't want, or is not in their best interests.

heroin was a legal substance...until prohibition...im not s
asking for everyone to buy it but of i can pay and not a complete loser why should i not be allowed my drug...they have theirs

[simon]

heroin was a legal substance...until prohibition...im not s
asking for everyone to buy it but of i can pay and not a complete loser why should i not be allowed my drug...they have theirs

Because heroin is bad because they say it is and it's illegal because they say it is.

[OP8S]

I tend to agree with Seven, drug's are drugs & for two of the most damaging to the NHS today to be so normalised in nearly every soap opera on TV while people are getting chucked off a script or arrested for possession of drug x rather than drug y is a total farce.
When this is accepted then treatment will change forever....I'm afraid that's fairyland though, if anybody benefits it will be the company directors of private uncharitable provider's & the people making a fortune providing bulk quantities. Both business men in suits who couldn't give a fuck about the individual.
I expect the internet will take over soon, all very civil I'm told.

[sapphire]

The "drug addict" that they had in Emmerdale died last night.

SO frustrating that they cannot get things right. You saw a foil of heroin under her bed, you know like what would be left over from someone smoking gear? You can't OD from smoking, especially not if you've got any tolerance to it.

They had a great chance to actually educate people on drugs, and do an interesting storyline, and they didn't, it was shit.

BTW - I do NOT watch soaps usually, I cannot stand them, Mr Sapphire however, it's his guilty pleasure. Idiot!

[OP8S]

They don't want to educate people about drug use in a realistic & truthful way.

Drugs are bad......except if they say they're not, as in alcohol & tobacco. Can't say that I've ever seen a cancer patient with a bottle of oxygen on any soaps before. Maybe there has been, I couldn't say as I never watch them. Best ask Mr Sapph. 

[sapphire]

He drives me fucking mad with them. I cannot stand them, and he actually watches X Factor in a non ironic way too. He denies it whenever I take the piss out of him about it though!!

[OP8S]

Love's a wonderful thing Sapph ! 

[seven]

They don't want to educate people about drug use in a realistic & truthful way.

Drugs are bad......except if they say they're not, as in alcohol & tobacco. Can't say that I've ever seen a cancer patient with a bottle of oxygen on any soaps before. Maybe there has been, I couldn't say as I never watch them. Best ask Mr Sapph. 

illegal drugs are bad....made so because of prohibition
as a 35 year and more user of legal opiates i can say it is certainly less harmeful than alcohol..i work all day and row for an hour after work  i am not overweight and have more hair than the average 30 year old...NOT grey...i am a prohibitionist nightmare ...my partner is the same and many many more people who live underground ....invisible normal lives, the only ones the prohibitionists see are the idiot junkie types who whack as much up as possible to get out of their brains and this is the perseption of an opiate user which is wrong. You dont associate every drinker as a tramp so why every opiate user as a junkie in need of recovery??

[simon]

illegal drugs are bad....made so because of prohibition
as a 35 year and more user of legal opiates i can say it is certainly less harmeful than alcohol..i work all day and row for an hour after work  i am not overweight and have more hair than the average 30 year old...NOT grey...i am a prohibitionist nightmare ...my partner is the same and many many more people who live underground ....invisible normal lives, the only ones the prohibitionists see are the idiot junkie types who whack as much up as possible to get out of their brains and this is the perseption of an opiate user which is wrong. You dont associate every drinker as a tramp so why every opiate user as a junkie in need of recovery??

We ran a project some years ago when funding was plentiful, prescribing from a needle exchange followed up by a clinic appointment two days later. I expected the very chaotic people to use it as a bit of an insurance policy with a cohort forever on tiny doses or missing clinic but they didn't. We had over 80% of them in treatment after one year and they did really well.
I never expected such results as previously we had a system with a same day appointment in clinic after an assessment at the drug service, they were still prescribed the same day but had to travel about a mile and a half a lot didn't come.
We did have a few complaints at first as some people were a bit loud, bit full of pills and couldn't sit still very long, over time they did make dramatic improvements and it surprised and pleased me.

[seven]

The classic "junkie" is a very visible tip of the iceberg...they do untold harm to those of us that can and do take a drug responsibly you don't judge drinkers by alcoholics, so why judge the majority of opiate users by some junkies.