METHADONE PROGRAM FULL, TURNS ADDICTS AWAY

Some drug addicts trying to get into methadone programs in Ottawa are being
turned away or placed on wait lists. This may put them back on the street.

"We're running at full capacity," says Rejeanne Cuerrier, director of the
Ste. Anne Medical Centre, which has a methadone program with 60 patients.

"We have at least 15 people on the wait list, but sometimes these people
disappear," she says. Once back on the street, they may resort to theft and
other crimes to fund their addictions.

Methadone is a synthetic drug used to break opiate addiction. It eases
withdrawal symptoms from drugs like heroin, morphine and codeine. It is
taken orally, often diluted in a small bottle of orange juice.

It's not only users of street drugs that are in methadone programs, says
Cuerrier. She also sees the "accidental victims," people hooked on
prescription painkillers.

Cuerrier compares methadone for opiate addicts to insulin for diabetics.
"Some people should be on methadone their whole life," she says.

Opiate addicts are often unstable, marginalized members of society, but
methadone addicts can work, raise families and live normally, she says.

Dr. Luc Laroche, one of two Ste. Anne's on-sight doctors who treat
methadone patients, says not enough doctors in Ottawa want to do his job.
Doctors must have a special licence to treat patients and prescribe
methadone, but not many want to bother.

Also, some doctors don't want a pregnant woman, a woman from Rockcliffe and
an addict all in the same waiting room, he says. "People right off the
street aren't wanted in GP's [general practitioner's] offices."

It's not profitable for doctors to treat methadone patients because their
treatment takes longer, says Laroche. So doctors who treat methadone
patients can make fewer OHIP billings.

"Regular physicians see many patients," says Laroche, while he only sees
eight on a typical morning.

Dr. Louis Morissette also runs a methadone program as part of his addiction
treatment centre. He has 45 methadone patients and doesn 't keep a wait
list, so he sometimes turns people away.

Morissette disagrees that methadone treatment is not profitable.

He says doctors bill OHIP $17 for a regular office visit, which could take
anywhere from two to 15 minutes. But if he treats a methadone patient, he
bills OHIP for counseling, $52 for 20 to 30 minutes, or $105 for one hour.

Morissette says the simple lack of doctors in Ottawa is the reason there
aren't enough who deal with methadone.

"There are not enough doctors, period," he says. "Most doctors have enough
work with family medicine," so they don't look for other patients.

"Nobody loses money," he says.

For the first three months of methadone treatment at Ste. Anne's, a patient
comes to the centre every day.

They must submit to a witnessed urine test to detect other drugs. It is
done in a bathroom with a two-way mirror so patients can't use somebody
else's urine.

Patients also attend group therapy and individual psychotherapy sessions.
The methadone is taken at a pharmacy in Ste. Anne's and witnessed by a doctor.

After three months, the patient is considered stabilized, says Cuerrier.

They then come to the centre less frequently and are allowed a "carry," or
take-home doses of methadone.

For methadone to be effective, a patient should be in the program for at
least 24 months. Phased out too soon, they may relapse back into opiate
addiction, she says.