thank you anyway for replying.. So when i do get into seeing a doctor, i must be in withdrawal? I am so confused on this issue. I am taking suboxone, but most likely have to take the lortab when it is out of my system because of the pain i do have. The lortabs are a prescription that i have been on for over a year. I just know that i can’t stop taking them on my own, thats why i tried the suboxone. I researched how to take it and it works wonders for me.
My Answer:
The primary issue with precipitated withdrawal isn’t so much being in withdrawal, but instead has to do with your level of tolerance. Tolerance goes up with every dose of an agonist, and plummets when a person is in withdrawal. In predicting precipitated withdrawal one looks at whether a person’s tolerance is higher or lower than it would be taking 30 mg of methadone per day. A person taking 100 mg of methadone per day who didn’t start withdrawal will have severe withdrawal during Suboxone induction; A person taking 10 mg of methadone per day who didn’t start withdrawal may actually get a mild ‘high’ during methadone induction. Lortab includes hydrocodone, the active ingredient in Vicodin. Hydrocodone is metabolized to a more potent drug—hydromorphone or Dilaudid—to varying degrees in different people (I am about to post something about that), so it is hard to predict the tolerance level in a person on hydrocodone. The tolerance depends on how their genetics make them metabolize the drug. For that reason one cannot simply say that 50 mg of vicodin per day won’t result in precipitated withdrawal. These metabolic relationships occur with other opiates as well and explain why some people say they have never had precipitated withdrawal, and other people do have it, despite taking the same doses of the same opiate.
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It is impossible to guarantee that precipitated withdrawal won’t occur, but one can make it exceedingly unlikely by reducing their use of opiates a bit as the induction approaches and then getting good and miserable before starting the induction by discontinuing use for 24 hours or so. People on super-high doses of a drug like methadone (which tends to stay around in the body for awhile) have the highest risk for precipitated withdrawal, but can make it unlikely by stopping use for 3-4 days, as tolerance drops the fastest in a person who completely stops using. For what it’s worth, I had precipitated withdrawal myself back in my using days on at least 3 occasions; twice, in desperation, I took oral naltrexone (an opiate blocker) thinking it would help me stop using; a third time I injected IV narcan by accident. The naltrexone incidents were the worst, as that drug lasts for 24 hours or so. It was pretty horrible, but I did live through it, and the experiences certainly gave me a stronger desire to stay clean!
SD
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