BACKGROUND: Opioid dependence is an increasing problem among adolescents and young adults, but in contrast to the standard in the adult population, adoption of pharmacotherapies has been slow. Extended-release naltrexone (XR-NTX) is a promising treatment that has been receiving increasing interest for adult opioid dependence. Clinical chart abstractions were performed on a convenience sample of 16 serial adolescent and young adult cases (mean age 18.5 years) treated for opioid dependence with XR-NTX who attended at least one out-patient clinical follow-up visit. CASE DESCRIPTIONS: Of these 16 cases, 10 of 16 (63%) were retained in treatment for at least 4 months and nine of 16 (56%) had a 'good' outcome defined as having substantially decreased opioid use, improvement in at least one psychosocial domain and no new problems due to substance use. CONCLUSIONS: These descriptive results suggest that XR-NTX in the treatment of adolescents and young adults with opioid dependence is well tolerated over a period of 4 months and feasible in a community-based treatment setting, and associated with good outcomes in a preliminary, small non-controlled case-series. This probably reflects an overall trend towards greater adoption of medication treatments for this population.
BACKGROUND: Opioid dependence is an increasing problem among adolescents and young adults, but in contrast to the standard in the adult population, adoption of pharmacotherapies has been slow. Extended-release naltrexone (XR-NTX) is a promising treatment that has been receiving increasing interest for adult opioid dependence. Clinical chart abstractions were performed on a convenience sample of 16 serial adolescent and young adult cases (mean age 18.5 years) treated for opioid dependence with XR-NTX who attended at least one out-patient clinical follow-up visit. CASE DESCRIPTIONS: Of these 16 cases, 10 of 16 (63%) were retained in treatment for at least 4 months and nine of 16 (56%) had a 'good' outcome defined as having substantially decreased opioid use, improvement in at least one psychosocial domain and no new problems due to substance use. CONCLUSIONS: These descriptive results suggest that XR-NTX in the treatment of adolescents and young adults with opioid dependence is well tolerated over a period of 4 months and feasible in a community-based treatment setting, and associated with good outcomes in a preliminary, small non-controlled case-series. This probably reflects an overall trend towards greater adoption of medication treatments for this population.
Authors: Adam Viera; Daniel J Bromberg; Shannon Whittaker; Bryan M Refsland; Milena Stanojlović; Kate Nyhan; Frederick L Altice Journal: Epidemiol Rev Date: 2020-01-31 Impact factor: 6.222
Authors: Marc Fishman; Kevin Wenzel; Jennifer Scodes; Martina Pavlicova; Joshua D Lee; John Rotrosen; Edward Nunes Journal: J Adolesc Health Date: 2020-08-29 Impact factor: 5.012