METHADONE CLINICS WILL LIMIT TAKE-HOME PRESCRIPTIONS

PORTLAND, Maine - Southern Maine's methadone clinics have agreed to limit
patients' take-home prescriptions at the request of state officials.

Following the Portland area's 17th overdose death of the year, the Maine
Office of Substance Abuse asked that the clinics open on Sundays and revoke
patients' biweekly and monthly take-home privileges.

The request came Wednesday, a day after the state released a report that
said Discovery House in South Portland and CAP Quality Care in Westbrook
were in compliance with all state and federal regulations and a day after a
20-year-old woman died of an apparent overdose of cocaine and methadone
obtained from a clinic patient.

"What we're doing is asking (the clinics) again to be more vigilant for
their sake, their clients' sake and the general public's sake," said Bill
Lowenstein, associate director of the Office of Substance Abuse. "We're not
requiring them to do this, but it was strongly suggested."

Lowenstein said no one is disputing the usefulness of methadone in treating
addiction to heroin and other opiates, but he said that the synthetic
narcotic is increasingly ending up in the hands of the wrong people.

Police and public health officials had asked the state to review the
clinics' operations because they feared patients had been selling or giving
away their take-home doses of methadone.

Since January, 17 people in greater Portland have died from drug overdoses
- - three times as many as during the same period last year. Methadone was a
factor in several cases.

Neither Steve Cotreau, program director at CAP Quality Care, nor Steve
Gumbley, the project director at Discovery House, could be reached for comment.

Lowenstein said both clinics were "more than eager" to comply with the
state's request to open on Sunday to eliminate the need for weekly
take-home doses and to stop allowing patients to take home two- and
four-week supplies.

The number of overdoses has prompted the state Emergency Medical Services
Board to consider allowing rescue workers other than paramedics to
administer Narcan.

Currently, only paramedics are allowed to administer the drug, which can
reverse the effects of a narcotics overdose. Rescue workers with basic-or
intermediate-level training cannnot administer Narcan.

In Portland, the change would allow some firefighters to treat overdose
victims.

In Portland alone, rescue personnel have responded to approximately 175
overdose calls since January.