FDA approves first generic naloxone nasal spray to treat opioid overdose

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration today granted final approval of the first generic naloxone hydrochloride nasal spray, commonly known as Narcan, a life-saving medication that can stop or reverse the effects of an opioid overdose. The agency is also planning new steps to prioritize the review of additional generic drug applications for products intended to treat opioid overdose, along with the previously announced action to help facilitate an over-the-counter naloxone product.

“In the wake of the opioid crisis, a number of efforts are underway to make this emergency overdose reversal treatment more readily available and more accessible. In addition to this approval of the first generic naloxone nasal spray, moving forward we will prioritize our review of generic drug applications for naloxone. The FDA has also taken the unprecedented step of helping to assist manufacturers to pursue approval of an over-the-counter naloxone product and is exploring other ways to increase the availability of naloxone products intended for use in the community, including whether naloxone should be co-prescribed with all or some opioid prescriptions to reduce the risk of overdose death,” said Douglas Throckmorton, M.D., deputy center director for regulatory programs in the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research. “All together, these efforts have the potential to put a vital tool for combatting opioid overdose in the hands of those who need it most – friends and families of opioid users, as well as first responders and community-based organizations. We’re taking many steps to improve availability of naloxone products, and we’re committed to working with other federal, state and local officials as well as health care providers, patients and communities across the country to combat the staggering human and economic toll created by opioid abuse and addiction.”

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Medication Assisted Treatment ( MAT ) gets a big expansion in California

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Medication Assisted Treatment ( MAT ) gets a big expansion in California

In an effort to address the opioid epidemic throughout the state, the California Department of Health Care Services (DHCS) is implementing the California Medication Assisted Treatment (MAT) Expansion Project. The California MAT Expansion Project aims to increase access to MAT, reduce unmet treatment need, and reduce opioid overdose related deaths through the provision of prevention, treatment, and recovery activities.

Visit the SAMSHA / State of California website here: http://choosemat.org/

Drug Treatment Program for Couples

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Five States to Pilot ‘Rating System for Addiction Treatment Programs’

The rating system would drive improvement by setting a standard in the industry and increasing transparency and accountability.  Five states are partnering with national nonprofit Shatterproof to create the Rating System for Addiction Treatment Programs — a system that would essentially do for addiction treatment centers what TripAdvisor does for hotels.  The system, according to the organization, will deliver “trustworthy, standardized information about the levels and quality of care offered at all types of treatment centers.”

The first three states are Louisiana, Massachusetts and New York, and they’ll be joined by two more, which Shatterproof says it will announce in the next few weeks.

SETTING A STANDARD
Creating such a system “will drive improvement among treatment programs by increasing accountability and transparency, and it will supply states and health-care payers with the information necessary to reward high-quality care,” according to Shatterproof, which Founder and CEO Gary Mendell launched after his son committed suicide over the shame he felt about his own addiction.

Abuse of tobacco, alcohol, illicit drugs and prescription opioids costs more than $740 billion annually by way of crime, lost work productivity and health care, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse. And according to a survey by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, as many as 90 percent of those who need drug rehab the most don’t receive it.

For those who do receive help, no system exists that makes it easy to choose a quality treatment program.

“The quality of care varies widely among addiction treatment programs, and individuals looking for care can’t identify high-quality programs,” Mendell said in a press release. “It is time a standard be set across all of addiction treatment, and the entire system aligns behind evidence-based care.”

Within the addiction treatment field, many addiction treatment practices are based not on what the evidence and research show best improves patient outcomes, said Samantha Arsenault, director of national treatment quality initiatives at Shatterproof, but on people’s life experiences, their philosophies about addiction or on payment structures versus what is best for the patient.

“One concrete example of that is that we are in the wake of an opioid epidemic and yet 60 percent of the specialty addiction treatment programs in the U.S. don’t offer a single medication to treat opioid use disorder,” she told Government Technology. “That would be like saying, ‘We are in the height of a diabetes crisis and 60 percent of the facilities that treat diabetes don’t offer insulin.’”

And this is why Shatterproof finds it absolutely critical not only to bring transparency for people seeking treatment so they can locate high-quality care, Arsenault added, but also to bring accountability to adhering to those best practices within the industry.

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FDA to broaden access to medication-assisted treatment for opioid addiction

New federal drug rehab bill inspired by “Florida Shuffle”

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source https://www.turningpointtreatmentcenter.com/five-states-to-pilot-rating-system-for-addiction-treatment-programs/