Hyperbaric oxygen therapy shows promise for opioid addiction treatment (Allows “significantly larger dose reduction” of methadone (4.3 mg vs. 0.25 mg))

Medical Xpress / Wash. State Univ. / Journal of Addictions Nursing / Brain Research ^ | Apr. 11, 2022 | Judith Van Dongen / Marian Wilson et al / Daniel Nicoara et al

[ConservativeMind]

Hyperbaric oxygen therapy may help people being treated for opioid addiction reduce their methadone dose and better manage pain and withdrawal symptoms.

The research team recruited participants enrolled in a local opioid treatment program to test the effects of hyperbaric oxygen therapy, a treatment that involves breathing pure oxygen in a pressurized environment.

The first paper showed that those who had received hyperbaric oxygen therapy as part of a planned methadone taper were able to maintain a significantly larger dose reduction of 4.3 mg three months after the study, as compared to 0.25 mg in participants who did not receive the therapy. They also reported half the level of withdrawal symptoms experienced by control participants after only one day of hyperbaric oxygen therapy.

"While methadone helps people with opioid addiction get stable and resume their normal lives, it's still an opioid that they are taking every day," said co-author Matthew Layton. "About half of people in treatment want to get off of methadone for various reasons, yet many who have tried have failed and relapsed. Our findings suggest that hyperbaric oxygen therapy could potentially be used as a non-pharmacological tool to help people step down their methadone treatment."

The second study found that participants in the hyperbaric oxygen therapy treatment group reported lower pain intensity and drug cravings than control participants who had been given an oxygen mixture equivalent to room air delivered at normal atmospheric pressure. The researchers also saw improvements in sleep quality and mood.

"While for some the challenge is to get off methadone, others struggle to stay in treatment," said first author Marian Wilson. "As a result, a lot of people experience withdrawal symptoms in that adjustment period that can be severe enough to make them resume illegal drug use or drop out of treatment."

[ConservativeMind]

This seems a great improvement which would help many get back to a functional life, much sooner.

[ConservativeMind]

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[Roadrunner383]

My dad and I hunted down in Fl. with a retired Navy diver. He went into business buying surplus hyperbaric chambers from the Fed. Gov’t and delivering them to hospitals. This was back in the early-mid 90s. People with chronic infections, particularly diabetics, really benefited from the treatments. The guy made a lot of money. It was so profitable that he could afford to have a few of them delivered by helicopter (although most were trucked in).

[golux]

As long as it helps the drug companies open new, highly lucrative transnational business enterprises spending obscene amounts of my tax dollars sending drug addicts to serene, squeaky-clean offices where they can ponder bonsai trees and suck on "medical grade" Oxygen provided by a network of drug company cronies, activists, and politicians, each offering outrageous overcharges and kickbacks to the other while I realize I can't afford a pound of ground chuck, I'm for it!

[Boogieman]

Well, it’s basically drug replacement therapy, but without the drugs, because high doses of oxygen get you high.

[golux]

I am a rescue diver and have some experience with the hairy eyeballs Oxygen supply people (i.e. Roberts Oxygen) give to people who are not on the official medical clientele lists. They also do everything they can to swindle people like me i.e., trading out my beautiful polished aluminum tanks for their cheap-ass steel ones whenever they get a chance.

[steve86]

For some reason our local hospital system, which normally is very successful, had to get rid of their hyperbaric chamber after prolonged lack of use. Not sure why that was the case; they marketed it extensively.

[ComputerGuy]

Fifty years ago I was one of DC’s finest vice cops. I watched heroine addicts by the dozen become addicted to a second drug: Methadone. Each one then had two monkeys on his back. One of them could only be satisfied by a visit to the clinic, as in gov’t. Heroine, otoh, was readily available.

[eyeamok]

In 1979 after a long talk with my 3 doctors, we decided the best course of action was for me to get addicted to opiates for the pain I had from my motorcycle accident. At the end of the 3 months I had to wait for surgery I was taking 50 Percodan a day(today’s Oxycontin), it took 1 week in the Hospital under managed care to get over it, I don’t know what they gave me, but it was a shot once or twice a day, I was still in tremendous pain and going thru withdrawls for a week, the withdrawl symptoms only lasted about 4 days, then a few more to make sure I was clean, then I had my surgery and all my pain was gone and so was my Addiction.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

Thanks very much for the one! Very helpful.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

Wow, that’s an amazing story! What great repurposing of the chambers.

[Pearls Before Swine]

Does the extra oxygen make you feel better? Asking for an in-law.

[dennisw]

Cheap-ass is one of my favorite put downs these days. It is accurate!

[RouxStir]

“Does the extra oxygen make you feel better?”

Yes it does. It’s kind of addicting...not physically but you feel very refreshed and alert. I had hyperbaric oxygen 8 years ago when I had a flesh eating bacterial infection...every day while I was hospitalized and 5 days a week after I was discharged. I think it was a total of about 100 days. It worked well to heal the areas where they removed a lot of skin and necrotic tissue.

[Pearls Before Swine]

Bad break to get a necrotizing infection.

Thanks for the I fo.