I will get to ‘Part II’, but today I talked with a patient about something that happens too often, that deserves to be pointed out. The person was in the ER with an injury that resulted in tib/fib francture. The ER doc provided no analgesia, in the ER or at discharge, telling the patient “you would get sick if I gave you pain medicine because you are on Suboxone.”
I have a few paragraphs typed up that I send to dentists, surgeons, and other physicians when a patient on buprenorphine has a painful procedure. I am pasting it below so that it can be copied, printed, and given to physicians to encourage them to do a bit of continuing medical education on the topic. Those of you who are already enlightened, please leave comments if you see something that you would change. I have literature to back up this type of approach; send me an email if you’d like the reference.
Painful Procedures and Buprenorphine Patients
Buprenorphine is a partial opioid agonist that is used for several indications. In low doses—less than 1 mg/day—buprenorphine is used to treat pain (e.g. Butrans transdermal buprenorphine). In higher doses i.e. 4 – 24 mg per day, buprenorphine is used as a long-term treatment for opioid dependence and less often for pain management. At those higher doses, Buprenorphine has a unique ‘ceiling effect’ that reduces cravings and prevents dose escalation. Patients taking higher dose of buprenorphine, trade name Suboxone or Subutex, become tolerant to the effects of opioids, and require special consideration during surgical procedures or when treated for painful medical conditions.
There are two hurdles to providing effective analgesia for patients taking buprenorphine: 1. the high opioid tolerance of these individuals, and 2. the opioid-blocking actions of buprenorphine. The first can be overcome by using a sufficient dose of opioid agonist, on the order of 60 mg per day of oxycodone-equivalents or more. The second can be handled by either stopping the buprenorphine a couple weeks before agonists are required—something that most patients on the medication find very difficult or impossible to do—or by reducing the dose of buprenorphine to 4-8 mg per day, starting the day before surgery and continuing through the post-op period. Given the long half-life of buprenorphine, it is difficult to know exactly how much remains in the body after ‘holding’ the medication. That fact, along with the difficulty patients have in stopping the medication, leads some physicians (including myself) to use the latter approach- i.e. to continue 4 mg of buprenorphine per day throughout the postoperative period. People taking 4-8 mg of daily buprenorphine say that opioid agonists relieve pain if taken in sufficient dosage, but the subjective experience is different, in that there is less ‘euphoria.’
Important points:
Patients on daily maintenance doses of buprenorphine do NOT receive surgical analgesia from buprenorphine alone, as they are tolerant to the mu-opioid effects of buprenorphine.
The naloxone in Suboxone does not reach the bloodstream in significant amounts, and has no relevance to the issue of post-operative pain and Suboxone/buprenorphine.
Discontinuation of high dose buprenorphine/Suboxone results in opioid withdrawal symptoms within 24-48 hours, similar to the discontinuation of methadone 40 mg/day.
Normal amounts of opioid pain medication are NOT sufficient for treating pain in people on buprenorphine maintenance.
Opioid agonists will NOT cause withdrawal in people taking buprenorphine. Initiating buprenorphine WILL precipitate withdrawal in someone tolerant to opioid agonists, unless the person is in opioid withdrawal before initiating buprenorphine.
Non-narcotic pain relievers CAN and should be used for pain whenever possible in people on buprenorphine to reduce need for opioids. Note that Ultram has opioid and non-opioid effects; the opioid effects are blocked by buprenorphine.
I have had success in people taking 4 mg of buprenorphine/day, using oxycodone, 15-30 mg every 4 hours. Some patients can control their own intake of oxycodone while on buprenorphine, but some patients CAN’T. Overdose IS possible, if patients take excessive amounts of the opioid agonist. Consider providing multiple prescriptions with ‘fill after’ dates, each for a very short period of time (e.g. 2 days each) to that patients do not have access to large amounts of opioids at one time.
For longer post-operative periods I have used combinations of long and short-duration agonists, e.g. Oxycontin 20 mg BID plus oxycodone, 15 mg q4 hours PRN.
The risk of death is high for opioid addicts not on buprenorphine. Buprenorphine/Suboxone has opioid-blocking effects that reduce risk of overdose and death. But EVERY patient combining opioid agonists with buprenorphine MUST do it in consultation with a physician who understands the patient’s specific body size and medical history.
Asking a person to stop or ‘hold’ their Suboxone also risks introducing significant risk of injury. Opioid addicts are NOT generally able to stop Suboxone without replacing it with illicit opioids.
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