Suboxone: A History of Drug Treatment that Works

Initially marketed in the 1980’s by Reckitt Benckiser, a British bases consumer health products company, Suboxone began as a pain reliever for treating severe, chronic pain. In very small doses it proved to more effective than morphine. With a similar chemical makeup to heroin and morphine, its reason for success is that it doesn’t give the patient or user the euphoric feeling that other opioids give.

In the 1960’s Methadone was found to be an effective and important drug for treating pain as well as drug treatment for heroin addiction. Methadone has sedative effects, and if taken in high doses can create euphoria that can lead to addiction. When Suboxone became legal in the U.S. by the Drug Addiction Treatment Act of 2000 it was found to be an effective alternative to Methadone in the treatment for opioid addiction, and because of it non-euphoric effects the patients using it became less likely to become addicted.

As the success rate for drug treatment continued for Suboxone the United States government continued to approve its usage through other agencies. In October of 2002 the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Suboxone for drug treatment, and then later in 2006 it was approved for the same purpose in Europe. In the meantime though, in 2003 the first ever Suboxone-based addiction treatment program was launched in the United States at Columbia University. Its success rate was 88%.

As recently as 2008 the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism determined that Suboxone is as effective for heroin drug treatment as Methadone, but with few safety risks and fewer deaths.