Naltrexone implants in opioid dependence: a proof of mechanism study with pk and pd measures

海洛因成瘾是一个重大的社会和健康问题，每年导致数千人死亡，也是许多其他健康、社会和犯罪问题的原因。目前的治疗方法是有效的，但它们依赖于让吸毒者继续服用替代药物，如美沙酮和丁丙诺啡，这些药物有效地让他们沉迷其中。SP限制了重返工作岗位的能力，还需要每天去诊所或药店就诊。一个更好的策略是用一种药物来阻断海洛因的大脑活动部位，这样吸毒者在服用海洛因时就不会有任何效果。事实证明，这对有很高动力服用阻滞剂的人(如医生)有效，但同样需要每天服药，以便很容易停止然后恢复使用海洛因。这笔赠款使用一种新的阻滞剂制剂，植入皮肤下[如长效DART避孕药]，因此有效期为3-6个月。在使用这一疗法之前，我们需要探索封锁持续多长时间，以便确定重复植入的时间，而这笔赠款就是为了做到这一点。根据我们的发现，我们应该能够用这种令人兴奋的新方法来设计海洛因成瘾的最佳治疗方案。

Heroin addiction is a major social and health problem that results in many thousands of deaths per year, and is also a cause of many other health social and criminal problems. Current treatments are effective but they rely on keeping addicts on alternative drugs such as methadone and buprenorphine that effectively keep them ?stoned? ? sp limiting the ability to return to work and also necessitating daily attendance at clinics or pharmacies. A much better strategy would be to use a drug to block the brain sites of action of heroin so that the addict got no effect when it was taken. This is proven to work in people with high motivation to take the blocker e.g. doctors, but again daily dosing is required so that it is easy to stop and then resume heroin use. This grant uses a new blocker preparation that is implanted under the skin [like the long-acting depot contraceptive pill] and so will work for between 3-6 months. Before using this as a treatment we need to explore just how long the blockade last so that the timing of repeat implants can be made and this grant is designed to do this. From our findings we should be able to design the optimal treatment package for heroin addiction with this exciting new approach.