Suboxone Doctors in San Diego

Suboxone works through both of its active ingredients buprenorphine and naloxone. Both compounds serve different purposes, but when combined together they can be highly effective in reducing symptoms of opioid use disorder.

To understand how they work together, let’s first look at how they work as stand-alone treatments.

Buprenorphine

Buprenorphine is a partial opioid agonist. Opioids like heroin or codeine are full opioid agonists. So as you might imagine, buprenorphine can induce similar feelings such as euphoria or respiratory depression — though at much weaker levels.

As a standalone treatment, buprenorphine can help:

• Reduce physical dependence to opioids, including withdrawal symptoms
• Reduce mental dependence to opioids, reducing cravings
• Lower the potential more opioid misuse
• Increase safety in cases of opioid overdose

Because of buprenorphine’s binding affinity to opioid receptors, it can displace other opioids (such as heroin or morphine). And, its partial agonistic activity greatly lowers the risk of respiratory depression.

It is also effective in reducing stress-related drug-seeking behaviors due to its ability to block dynorphins — which drive anxiety, stress and are a large factor in relapse.

Naloxone

Naloxone is an opioid antagonist. This means that it attaches to opioid receptors and strips those receptors of other opioids with lower binding affinities (i.e. heroin, morphine, etc.).

This opioid-blocking property of Naloxone makes it extremely useful in the case of opioid overdoses. Thanks to California law AB 1535, Californians can purchase naloxone over-the-counter at any participating pharmacy. Brief in-store training must be completed before purchase.

Because naloxone blocks the effects of opioids, it can put the user into precipitated (immediate) withdrawals. The addition of buprenorphine in Suboxone makes precipitated withdrawal much less likely.

Naloxone is not a treatment for opioid use disorder, but its properties can be exceptionally useful when combined with buprenorphine.

Buprenorphine-Naloxone in Suboxone

As listed above, Suboxone is 4 parts buprenorphine and 1 part naloxone. They are paired together to create a medicine that is highly effective in opioid treatment.

Buprenorphine in itself can sometimes be used as a treatment for OUD, though its euphoric properties can lead to habit-forming. Buprenorphine is most commonly used as a temporary treatment, reducing the dosage over time — so these properties can be problematic.

The naloxone ingredients in Suboxone lower the likelihood of misuse and lessen the euphoric properties of buprenorphine.

Suboxone can cause both mild and severe side effects, especially when misused. Your prescribing doctor will explain its intended use that may be unique to your condition.

For severe cases of opioid use disorder, Suboxone may be used in long-term treatment programs. Long-term use increased the chance of certain side effects.

Please note this is not a complete list. Anyone prescribed Suboxone should read the official Suboxone Prescribing Information and Suboxone Medication Guide.