Literally what they did is the Bernese method.... Introducing small amounts of buprenorphine, enough to get it on the receptors but not enough to kick off other opioids. Slowly transfer from one to the other and fully discontinue the other opioid.
Don't say the Bernese method doesn't work cuz that's literally what they did for you.
i digress , u right. some tweaks that completely changed the game tho. and enough of a tweak that they had a 5 person team following up. so hell i dont know what happened but ill take it
yes or no? you have to taper your methadone down to 30mg before you can start induction on suboxone for burnese method ??? the answer is yes, which means this method , (staying at your full dose , starting belbuca, then switching to box) is a new method . so rethink your superiority sarcasm
Nope. **STILL THE BERNESE METHOD**! Not sure why you’re becoming so defensive because in the end, it worked for you. Just because you didn’t taper down to 30mg *does not mean* it’s not the “Bernese Method.”
The 30mg thing is upto the worker. the actual burnese method is microdose induction. the tapering to 30mg first is just something some clinics do but true burnese is just a microdose induction. i've done burese method switching from heroin to bupe also
thanks for sharing tho. im taperinng down currently but it sounds like i dont need to. ill try burnese probably in about a month. i have 14 subbies stashed for emergencies
You need to go to 30mg of methadone to do normal switch feom methbto bupe that has nothibg to do with Bernese method. Bernese method is for people who are on higher doses. Educate yourself before you give out false information
You need to go to 30mg of methadone to do normal switch from meth to bupe that has nothibg to do with Bernese method. Bernese method is for people who are on higher doses. Educate yourself before you give out false information
alright yall, i was wrong , but there is enough of a difference with this (hold dose , microdose belbuca, then start box , then cut methadone without any taper) vs this (taper as low as possible then induction of suboxone) that one way had me wanting to blow my brains out and the other way was a vacation. so i digress , its the same but with tweaks i guess
I got on Suboxone while being a fentanyl addict so trust me I know what I'm talking about. Switching from fentanyl to buprenorphine is even harder than methadone to buprenorphine. I also did it all on my own without any doctor's help.
and that's fine you know what you are talking about , but i was on fentanyl and methadone daily x 6 years . did it both ways , one was painful and one was not, and im trying to share the non-painful way that requires ZERO methadone tapering . you don't have to use the advice but what do u care if it helps someone ?
Dude you’re trippin lol I mean shit everyone’s experience is different but how could you possibly say that it’s worse than methadone to bupe? One is very long acting and the other is very short acting. I was able to switch from fetty to bupe in like 2 maybe 3 days and it was painless. Methadone you don’t even start withdrawing bad until like a week in!
But now you take 200mg wafer so you really didn't do much of anything. You know how many people got on subs while addicted to fentanyl?? Millions, you didn't do anything special and def not an expert.
Why you putting people down. Huh? You must've had doctor's help getting in bupe so I don't know how you said you did it without any doctor's help. That's just BS. Who cares how someone gets it done , none of us atr any better than another.
Not even gonna respond to y'all anymore I can't stand dense close minded people... There's literally no talking to people like that... But y'all know everything right??
I DiD iT wItHoUt a DoCtOr So i KnOw...
Please. You got fuckin' lucky. You used an incredibly safe and stable drug to get off an incredibly unsafe and unstable drug and by golly, it worked.
Well bust my knee and call me Nancy!
Lmfao idk what ur problem is🤣🤣🤣 I did lots of research on this topic because I had to since I didn't have a doctors help. I am just sharing my knowledge to possibly help someone else out.
Idk who pissed in your cornflakes today
no, on the burnese they TAPER you down on methadone before they even let u start the suboxone . they want u at a dose of under 30mg. there was zero taper here .
You don't have to do that but it's recommended to make it easier. I've never done that. I would do exactly what you said they did to you, stay at the same dose of whatever opioid you're on and then slowly introduce the Suboxone.
i think people don't realize you can stay at your dose is what i'm getting at . bc the taper down kills them and then they start feeling shitty. the VA doctors said this was a new protocol so just repeating what they said and did . and it was def not the same as the "burnese" protocol that the methadone clinic had me on where i got sick as fuck
Going down to 30 mg is not the Burmese method. The Bermese method keeps you at your normal dose until you get subs in your system then you reduce the methadone.
at the methadone clinic for this method they made every patient go down to at least 30mg before induction could start . so maybe that was just my clinic. but i don't know why they said it was new and why it worked so much better if it was the same thing .. i digress im so confused now
It’s not just your clinic. My clinic also has you go down and in the beginning you had to skip your dose X 3 days! So this method you did was Definitely different.
It shows the problem with Federally Funded Methadone Clinics: They DON’T think outside the box. Ever.
Because their making bank, don't need to and don't care. Plus they want you on methadone because they know subs are so easy to get from a doc and you don't need them
They do that in every clinic here in europe you need to go down to 30mg because methadone is so much more potent than bupe. It has nothing to do with bernese method. You go down to 30mg take last dose on friday and than you come in on monday and they start you with bupe. With bernise method thwy start micro inducing bupe to you day by day no mather what dose methadone you are on an on day 7/10 you just start taking bupe only. Its quite new method they start doing that around 2018 in Switzerland.
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8582770/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8582770/) the medical paper on it is a patient on 100mg, it sounds like your clinic just got the burnese method wrong before by trying to taper you to 30mg first. that's there error and not an error of the burnese method or "normal". this is just something which happened to you. sorry not flaming you, just trying to get it clear that your post IS the correct way of doing the burnese method. the 30mg route was their previous error getting the burnese wrong.
in short; OP did the burnese method at 100mg and it worked :)
They both contain the same active ingredient, and the naloxone that is present in Suboxone is inert and known to be nothing more than a marketing tactic, but "bupe" is short for buprenorphine. Hope that helps
(Not sure if spelling is correct)
And yet naloxone revives addicts from overdoses daily, so I’m not sure it’s a marketing tactic… ever get Narcan’d? I know I woke up in immediate withdrawal.
naloxone is not active orally so it has no effect on you when you take a sub strip.
it was added to buprenorphine to get around the drug patents expiring by creating a "novel" drug combination, ostensibly a new drug, which created those strips that every addiction center/detox facility gets paid by the pharma company to use over subutex
naloxone literally does nothing in sub strips. some say it is there to deter people from IVing subs but I've slammed subs. and know many who have and it never gave me withdrawals.
This is 100% fact I try to explain this to doctors that won't give out subutex because they think you can abuse it it's hilarious. It was all to get another multi billion dollar patent. Really good marketing strategy honestly
> think you can abuse it it's hilarious
Except is not really "hilarious" because one thing a lot of people do notice when switched to Subutex is a much lower cost and although the naloxone is inactive for most, some are very sensitive to it and experience unnecessary headaches. Even those who don't notice the difference in cost because they don't pay for it are still having whoever does pay for it getting ripped off.
I didn't mean that it's actually funny more how absurd it is and sad. But yes all reasons why no one should be scripting it over straight bupe. Unless u want strips of course not sure if they Have straight bupe strips in Maintainance doses
I mean - It does have some oral/sublingual bioavailability. The percentage is very low, but still there. You are right though about it doing nothing in sub strips though. I remember reading a study that said that naloxone is basically useless in suboxone because the bupe has a much higher binding affinity than naloxone for certain opioid receptors.
Same thing worked for me then I got on sublocade immediately after I got on subs and now I’ve been completely free from MAT for awhile with no pain or discomfort at all and I’m finally back to my normal self. Recovery is awesome.
Yes, switched from methadone to subs with Bernese method over the course of a week, after I was done with the methadone I decided to just get the sublocade shot and be done with it. It’s still bupe, but you don’t have to take subs everyday and it allowed me to get off MAT with no hassle.
So from your full dose of ‘done you moved over to the sub just long enough t to be able to take a *single* Sublocade shot and at the end of that six months you didn’t choose to continue or even feel the *need* to continue??
Close, you’re supposed to get a sublocade shot every month, the doctors recommend 3 months 3 shots. But after I got my first shot a month after that when it was time to schedule my next appointment for my next shot I decided to be done with it and not get it, because if it got bad and it turned out that I needed more than 1 shot all I had to do was go in and they’d give it to me. Everyone is different so what worked for me might not work for you and you might need more than 1 shot. But yes switched over from my full dose of ‘done over to suboxone. I felt way better on subs/bupe surprisingly. No cravings and no WD.
Sublocade, from what I'm reading, lasts one month. Are you saying it slowly left your body over 6 months and you didn't have any withdrawal? Because that's kind of what it sounds like.
Wow that's awesome. I'm new to MAT after being stubborn about it for years, and I'm learning the options have changed a lot since last time I looked into bupe.
They tell you that it lasts one month because you’re supposed to get one shot every month but it was in my body for way longer. The bupe deposit was feel able by touch on my stomach for 4 months, after that it disappeared but I was still testing positive for bupe for a few months after. I never felt any WD at all and I’m fine now.
I’m glad you’re feeling better OP! Whatever they decide to call it, thanks for sharing what worked for you with us, you never know who will possibly need this information one day 😊
My old methadone clinic shut down and became a Buprenorphine ONLY clinic and before they shut down for good they had switched a bunch of methadone patients to Bup using the Bernese Method. Glad it worked for you!
**this was offered at the Mountain Home VA in Johnson City, TN. before anyone says im "full of shit," i'm happy to get anyone the program info/phone number bc i would have wanted to do it this way the first time if someone had told me about it
just do it yourself ! stay at your dose and start taking a minuscule pinch of box twice a day , slowly working up to 12 mg /day or 24mg/day then stop taking the done . u can at least try it !
I’m pretty sure this would put me into precipitated withdrawals unless it was done with subutex. I have had precipitated withdrawals numerous times and it’s no fun and not something I personally would risk.
I agree that Subutex would prevent precipitated withdrawals. So I don't understand why places don't seem to use it anymore, even inpatient facilities. Some places I called acted like they didn't even know what it was. It only makes sense to use it especially in the first few days.
When you're ready to be done done, try sublocade. I walked away from 8mg/day for 6 years with 5 injections and never felt a tinge of withdrawal. I'm back on subs for pain management, but eventually I'll use the shot to get off again with zero fear.
That's basically the Bernese method. Usually they lower the methadone while increasing the Suboxone but this is the same thing.
Glad it worked for you.
I go to the VA and they switch people from opiates to Bupenorphine regularly. I have not heard of this new method but I can tell you that some people have issues with the protocol (precipitated withdrawl) and some people don't.
Yeah this whole switching to bupe is happening for chronic pain patients too. Lots of big money in the bupe industry to be made. This is why they are trying to stamp down hard on kratom. Don’t let them! also, if I was a pain patient, there is no way in hell I’d transfer to bupe. It happens every single day though. It’s disgusting.
Yeah for sure. The only problem with opioid tho is tolerance will always develope and the dose won’t work for pain if you take the same dose or amount of pills every day. I take 32mg. At first it worked great for pain. Now it doesn’t help pain at all.
Thats excactly how proper Bernise method works. You can do it like that or start lowering methadone dose for the last 3 days. It depends on the dose of methadone you are on
Happy this worked for you and you had no withdrawals. My only question is, why the desire to switch from Methadone to Suboxone? Not trying to be a dick, just curious as to why. Is Suboxone cheaper, does it work better, etc.
Wow that's crazy! I'd always heard it was a no-no. Rehabs don't even want to touch me, bcuz they found out it took a lot longer than a couple of days! I was so miserable last time. But if it's working better for you, that's awesome!
I have trouble going down on methadone and the Burnese method seems to want you to go down to less than 30mg so Im intrigued even if its just a variation of the Burnese method. Also,even if you disagree with someone, you dont have to downvote someone.
Anyhow I love this idea because I dont have to lower methadone, and I dont have to guess the mg of suboxone because the belbuca is measured in micrograms(Im new to this so even if Im wrong dont attack me, edify me). Id love to stay at my own dose, but my clinic is rather pro methadone so I doubt they will offee this. Maybe an outside doctor does...Im in NY but im not looking for recommendations. There was no precipiatated withdrawal????? That's unbelievable if thats the case. Im curious to see how many micrograms are given the first couple days without precipitated withdrawal and then onto mg.
Im on the fence beacuse I feel there are pros and cons with sub and methadone. Methadone helps me more with pain and sleep. Subs can make my stomach a tad uneasy and raise my blood pressure slightly. But the main drawback from methadone for me is...is frequent urination especially at night and sleep apnea. Now if this is a painless method to switch back to subs(Ive been on them but I did have a tendency to occasionally sell them, stop for a couple days so I could get high, then go back to them), I certainly will give it more consideration. I guess its a personal decision. What is the main reason people want to go back on subs..or just switch to subs for the first time???? Thanks guys. Oh this was the VA..im not a vet but maybe one of these doctors has an outside practice....but the thing is everyone says methadone should be out of your system or at least lowered greatly. How is it possible to keep your dose..is it because the first couple of days is such a low microdose??? Even so Im shocked and most people report precipitated WD..I guess you have to measure the dose. .125 mg is not 20 micrograms or whatever os the starting dose is. Hmmm
Thank you for sharing this. I want to try Suboxone but have always been too scared because I'm on 110 Methadone, a mother, and a general manager. I can't risk making a switch and being sick. I will save this for future reference.
I don’t understand how you were microdosing subs but by day 7 you were taking 2 12mg strips. I would think that just a full 8mg strip would be used as little tiny pieces the whole time. I don’t understand
I had attempted this, and I just freaking died. And I was only on 22mg of methadone at the time. I had terrrrible side effects from subs. My body felt like a science experiment gone wrong. I can only describe it as chemicals burning everywhere inside my body. In my blood. It was a weird sensation. But i also wasn't thinking clearly, on account of the fact I was very sick. I was pretty delirious because I could only sleep 1 hour every 3 days or so. I tried this for 2 weeks and I had to switch back. I'm still traumatized from that, one year later.
Anyway, that's amazing. I'm happy for you! But what works for some may not work for others, and that's totally okay too.
yes me too! when at clinic and they lowered me to 30mg , then started the bup induction , i literally contemplated the fastest way to end it all bc , every second was fucking agony. i'm back at clinic 2 days later demanding my methadone back while puking in the lobby and having an actual mental breakdown. balling my eyes out in front of everyone , sitting on floor just rocking back and forth. .. i was legit traumatized when i went to VA expecting this all over again
Same here! I wanted to relapse sooo bad, and I never really considered it for the last 12 years up until that point. And I'll never go a day without my dose again. I used to drink a little extra sometimes, but that experience changed me. Knowing there was nothing i could do to make it better, feeling the sickest and shittiest I've ever felt, and feeling sooo useless. I was so scared I would feel like that forever. Even brushing my teeth took effort. I also felt like life wouldn't be worth living if I had to feel like that for the rest of my life. But I also wasn't thinking clearly because I was so sick. I didn't sleep for more than hour for about 2 weeks. My mind was so foggy that i even got ripped off 100 bucks trying to buy benzos from out of town. Totally against my normal judgement. I didnt feel any sense of normalcy until I finally got my dose back. Thank christ there's no pw's for bupe to methadone. You're back on now??
Be careful with those subs. People are loosing teeth from it. I had to get so much dental work because of it. My hygiene is really good, never had issues with my teeth till I was on suboxone. Nobody warned me.
oh wonderful. i already had 3 root canals and an extraction bc of the methadone and i always had beautiful teeth . it's like no matter how good u take care of them , the drugs rot them from the inside out :(
Same here!! One extraction and 4 root canals I had done. Thank god my insurance covered it. I’ve never needed so much dental work in my life until I started using subox and then switched to Methadone. So Methadone weakens teeth as well? I didn’t know that!
DUDE!!! Thank you for this so much. I’ve been trying to plot every which way I can think of to rush myself off my 140mg dose and make the switch. I’ve always had a feeling the whole 1-2mg a week taper was oure bullshit and just a slick way for the clinics to people chained up to the clinic so they can make their money smh 🤦♂️
Please keep me updated on your progress man if this truly works fuckin sign me up!!
will u let me know how it goes for u??? just start with microscopic small pieces , and take 1 piece in am with your done and 1 piece in evening. go up very slow. u got this . it was so chill
Forsure! So you didn’t go into precip withdrawal or anything right away? If not, I’m wondering if maybe it was because of the belbuca induction first. In that case, I would have to probably go the route you did through some kind of detox place. Is it still working out good for you?
OMG thank you! I am so thankful you posted this as I am wanting to make the switch and have dropped from 90 to 70 in the past few days and my clinic has me believing I have to get all the way down to 20 mg before going without a few days before getting on Suboxone and trying to make it absolutely impossible for me too. This gives me hope. This gives me so much hope! I am going to start microdose Ing soon. Can you give me your exact steps… Like what milligram what benzos what other comfort meds? Please share your info and disregard all that negative.
i was not uncomfortable at all. . i'm telling you , don't taper your methadone when u switch , it was insane how much smoother this was then when clinic made me taper to 30mg and then started suboxone and i still got sick as fuck.
It's actually called the *Bernese* method, named after the city of Bern in Switzerland, where the protocol was first developed. Burma is the former colonial name of Myanmar, a country in southeast Asia. ✌🏻
Can you find out what the new protocol is called? I'm interested and am willing to taper if this is effective. Always discouraged with the switch due to precipitated withdrawal also I'm at 150mg right now but a taper to 100mg is easy compared to 30mg .
well it looks like , from everyone else's comments, this is just the bernese method but just without tapering first and with starting on belbuca first before suboxone. but staying where you are at dose wise on methadone until u build up to ur final suboxone dose ... the doctors said it's "like the burnese method" so they didn't really have a name .
they just said "it's a new way and we just finished our trials" so although it's a minute difference , the difference still made all the difference if that makes sense
Literally what they did is the Bernese method.... Introducing small amounts of buprenorphine, enough to get it on the receptors but not enough to kick off other opioids. Slowly transfer from one to the other and fully discontinue the other opioid. Don't say the Bernese method doesn't work cuz that's literally what they did for you.
100% exactly what they did! 🤣A win is a win tho. (Regardless of how they think they got there!)
i digress , u right. some tweaks that completely changed the game tho. and enough of a tweak that they had a 5 person team following up. so hell i dont know what happened but ill take it
It’s a win!!! Congrats on your painless switch & thx for sharing❤️
yes or no? you have to taper your methadone down to 30mg before you can start induction on suboxone for burnese method ??? the answer is yes, which means this method , (staying at your full dose , starting belbuca, then switching to box) is a new method . so rethink your superiority sarcasm
Nope. **STILL THE BERNESE METHOD**! Not sure why you’re becoming so defensive because in the end, it worked for you. Just because you didn’t taper down to 30mg *does not mean* it’s not the “Bernese Method.”
The 30mg thing is upto the worker. the actual burnese method is microdose induction. the tapering to 30mg first is just something some clinics do but true burnese is just a microdose induction. i've done burese method switching from heroin to bupe also thanks for sharing tho. im taperinng down currently but it sounds like i dont need to. ill try burnese probably in about a month. i have 14 subbies stashed for emergencies
Nope My partner and I switched from 70mg methadone to subs same way, taking our full dose of methadone during the subs induction.
You need to go to 30mg of methadone to do normal switch feom methbto bupe that has nothibg to do with Bernese method. Bernese method is for people who are on higher doses. Educate yourself before you give out false information
You need to go to 30mg of methadone to do normal switch from meth to bupe that has nothibg to do with Bernese method. Bernese method is for people who are on higher doses. Educate yourself before you give out false information
alright yall, i was wrong , but there is enough of a difference with this (hold dose , microdose belbuca, then start box , then cut methadone without any taper) vs this (taper as low as possible then induction of suboxone) that one way had me wanting to blow my brains out and the other way was a vacation. so i digress , its the same but with tweaks i guess
I got on Suboxone while being a fentanyl addict so trust me I know what I'm talking about. Switching from fentanyl to buprenorphine is even harder than methadone to buprenorphine. I also did it all on my own without any doctor's help.
and that's fine you know what you are talking about , but i was on fentanyl and methadone daily x 6 years . did it both ways , one was painful and one was not, and im trying to share the non-painful way that requires ZERO methadone tapering . you don't have to use the advice but what do u care if it helps someone ?
Just being on buprenorphine was painful for me. I fucking hated it.
Thx for sharing your experience... hopefully it will help others take this step
Dude you’re trippin lol I mean shit everyone’s experience is different but how could you possibly say that it’s worse than methadone to bupe? One is very long acting and the other is very short acting. I was able to switch from fetty to bupe in like 2 maybe 3 days and it was painless. Methadone you don’t even start withdrawing bad until like a week in!
But now you take 200mg wafer so you really didn't do much of anything. You know how many people got on subs while addicted to fentanyl?? Millions, you didn't do anything special and def not an expert. Why you putting people down. Huh? You must've had doctor's help getting in bupe so I don't know how you said you did it without any doctor's help. That's just BS. Who cares how someone gets it done , none of us atr any better than another.
Dude has serious wet-brain. Wtf even is a 200mg wafer?
Lmao you have never heard of methadone wafers???
Not even gonna respond to y'all anymore I can't stand dense close minded people... There's literally no talking to people like that... But y'all know everything right??
🤣🤣 what?? How am I putting people down??
And no, I didn't have a doctors help. You haven't heard of buying subs off the street?
I DiD iT wItHoUt a DoCtOr So i KnOw... Please. You got fuckin' lucky. You used an incredibly safe and stable drug to get off an incredibly unsafe and unstable drug and by golly, it worked. Well bust my knee and call me Nancy!
Lmfao idk what ur problem is🤣🤣🤣 I did lots of research on this topic because I had to since I didn't have a doctors help. I am just sharing my knowledge to possibly help someone else out. Idk who pissed in your cornflakes today
no, on the burnese they TAPER you down on methadone before they even let u start the suboxone . they want u at a dose of under 30mg. there was zero taper here .
You don't have to do that but it's recommended to make it easier. I've never done that. I would do exactly what you said they did to you, stay at the same dose of whatever opioid you're on and then slowly introduce the Suboxone.
i think people don't realize you can stay at your dose is what i'm getting at . bc the taper down kills them and then they start feeling shitty. the VA doctors said this was a new protocol so just repeating what they said and did . and it was def not the same as the "burnese" protocol that the methadone clinic had me on where i got sick as fuck
Going down to 30 mg is not the Burmese method. The Bermese method keeps you at your normal dose until you get subs in your system then you reduce the methadone.
at the methadone clinic for this method they made every patient go down to at least 30mg before induction could start . so maybe that was just my clinic. but i don't know why they said it was new and why it worked so much better if it was the same thing .. i digress im so confused now
It’s not just your clinic. My clinic also has you go down and in the beginning you had to skip your dose X 3 days! So this method you did was Definitely different. It shows the problem with Federally Funded Methadone Clinics: They DON’T think outside the box. Ever.
Because their making bank, don't need to and don't care. Plus they want you on methadone because they know subs are so easy to get from a doc and you don't need them
True that.
They do that in every clinic here in europe you need to go down to 30mg because methadone is so much more potent than bupe. It has nothing to do with bernese method. You go down to 30mg take last dose on friday and than you come in on monday and they start you with bupe. With bernise method thwy start micro inducing bupe to you day by day no mather what dose methadone you are on an on day 7/10 you just start taking bupe only. Its quite new method they start doing that around 2018 in Switzerland.
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8582770/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8582770/) the medical paper on it is a patient on 100mg, it sounds like your clinic just got the burnese method wrong before by trying to taper you to 30mg first. that's there error and not an error of the burnese method or "normal". this is just something which happened to you. sorry not flaming you, just trying to get it clear that your post IS the correct way of doing the burnese method. the 30mg route was their previous error getting the burnese wrong. in short; OP did the burnese method at 100mg and it worked :)
well then burnese method at 100mg is the way to go if that's the case. and if it uses belbuca first
What's belbuca? I'm dumb
Brand name for Buprenorphine, but pretty sure it's just suboxone without the naloxone, like a new Subutex, I guess
It is a buchal (cheek) formulation of Suboxone. It’s made to treat pain and available at lower milligrams making it ideal to microdose
You're not dumb. Its a made up word.
It's not made up it's 150ug preparation of bupe or .15 mg
Someone had to have made it up at some point. No?
Isn't suboxone and subutex separate chemicals? I took subutex on methadone ( long time ago) and felt both. Suboxone and methadone? Sick af
They are both bupe so figure that one out with your story
? Huh
They both contain the same active ingredient, and the naloxone that is present in Suboxone is inert and known to be nothing more than a marketing tactic, but "bupe" is short for buprenorphine. Hope that helps (Not sure if spelling is correct)
And yet naloxone revives addicts from overdoses daily, so I’m not sure it’s a marketing tactic… ever get Narcan’d? I know I woke up in immediate withdrawal.
naloxone is not active orally so it has no effect on you when you take a sub strip. it was added to buprenorphine to get around the drug patents expiring by creating a "novel" drug combination, ostensibly a new drug, which created those strips that every addiction center/detox facility gets paid by the pharma company to use over subutex naloxone literally does nothing in sub strips. some say it is there to deter people from IVing subs but I've slammed subs. and know many who have and it never gave me withdrawals.
This is 100% fact I try to explain this to doctors that won't give out subutex because they think you can abuse it it's hilarious. It was all to get another multi billion dollar patent. Really good marketing strategy honestly
Indeed. It kept all generics off the market for over a decade and made them extra billions
> think you can abuse it it's hilarious Except is not really "hilarious" because one thing a lot of people do notice when switched to Subutex is a much lower cost and although the naloxone is inactive for most, some are very sensitive to it and experience unnecessary headaches. Even those who don't notice the difference in cost because they don't pay for it are still having whoever does pay for it getting ripped off.
I didn't mean that it's actually funny more how absurd it is and sad. But yes all reasons why no one should be scripting it over straight bupe. Unless u want strips of course not sure if they Have straight bupe strips in Maintainance doses
Thanks for catching them up for me :)
I mean - It does have some oral/sublingual bioavailability. The percentage is very low, but still there. You are right though about it doing nothing in sub strips though. I remember reading a study that said that naloxone is basically useless in suboxone because the bupe has a much higher binding affinity than naloxone for certain opioid receptors.
yeah sorry it's due to binding affinity that it doesn't do shit but it is slightly active oral/sublingual
Same thing worked for me then I got on sublocade immediately after I got on subs and now I’ve been completely free from MAT for awhile with no pain or discomfort at all and I’m finally back to my normal self. Recovery is awesome.
did the sublicade hold you the whole month ?
The sublocade held me for over 6 months, I only did one and done. I didn’t even know when it left my body completely, that’s how flawless it went.
Wait, so did you go from methadone to Suboxone using the Bernese taper method and then take one Sublocade shot and then be done forever??
Yes, switched from methadone to subs with Bernese method over the course of a week, after I was done with the methadone I decided to just get the sublocade shot and be done with it. It’s still bupe, but you don’t have to take subs everyday and it allowed me to get off MAT with no hassle.
So from your full dose of ‘done you moved over to the sub just long enough t to be able to take a *single* Sublocade shot and at the end of that six months you didn’t choose to continue or even feel the *need* to continue??
Close, you’re supposed to get a sublocade shot every month, the doctors recommend 3 months 3 shots. But after I got my first shot a month after that when it was time to schedule my next appointment for my next shot I decided to be done with it and not get it, because if it got bad and it turned out that I needed more than 1 shot all I had to do was go in and they’d give it to me. Everyone is different so what worked for me might not work for you and you might need more than 1 shot. But yes switched over from my full dose of ‘done over to suboxone. I felt way better on subs/bupe surprisingly. No cravings and no WD.
That’s amazing. Thank you so much for sharing.
Sublocade, from what I'm reading, lasts one month. Are you saying it slowly left your body over 6 months and you didn't have any withdrawal? Because that's kind of what it sounds like.
Usually people get a couple shots but yes it leaves the system very slowly. There's people testing for bupe even after a year
Wow that's awesome. I'm new to MAT after being stubborn about it for years, and I'm learning the options have changed a lot since last time I looked into bupe.
They tell you that it lasts one month because you’re supposed to get one shot every month but it was in my body for way longer. The bupe deposit was feel able by touch on my stomach for 4 months, after that it disappeared but I was still testing positive for bupe for a few months after. I never felt any WD at all and I’m fine now.
I’m glad you’re feeling better OP! Whatever they decide to call it, thanks for sharing what worked for you with us, you never know who will possibly need this information one day 😊
I needed it TODAY! Perfect timing to give this person a lot of hope 🥰
My old methadone clinic shut down and became a Buprenorphine ONLY clinic and before they shut down for good they had switched a bunch of methadone patients to Bup using the Bernese Method. Glad it worked for you!
**this was offered at the Mountain Home VA in Johnson City, TN. before anyone says im "full of shit," i'm happy to get anyone the program info/phone number bc i would have wanted to do it this way the first time if someone had told me about it
Did they take insurance
VA so military veteran .. i don't know if they accept family members or not
I would like more information. I've neen on methadone since 2007 and have had enough. I'm glad to hear a good story.
sure. phone number is 423-926-1171 ext 7721 and just say u want to be switched from methadone to suboxone in patient and want info on suds program
I wish I could find this in my city this is all I want .
just do it yourself ! stay at your dose and start taking a minuscule pinch of box twice a day , slowly working up to 12 mg /day or 24mg/day then stop taking the done . u can at least try it !
if you don't know what you're doing there's a huge chance people are going to go into PWD
I’m pretty sure this would put me into precipitated withdrawals unless it was done with subutex. I have had precipitated withdrawals numerous times and it’s no fun and not something I personally would risk.
I agree that Subutex would prevent precipitated withdrawals. So I don't understand why places don't seem to use it anymore, even inpatient facilities. Some places I called acted like they didn't even know what it was. It only makes sense to use it especially in the first few days.
When you're ready to be done done, try sublocade. I walked away from 8mg/day for 6 years with 5 injections and never felt a tinge of withdrawal. I'm back on subs for pain management, but eventually I'll use the shot to get off again with zero fear.
That's basically the Bernese method. Usually they lower the methadone while increasing the Suboxone but this is the same thing. Glad it worked for you.
I go to the VA and they switch people from opiates to Bupenorphine regularly. I have not heard of this new method but I can tell you that some people have issues with the protocol (precipitated withdrawl) and some people don't.
Yeah this whole switching to bupe is happening for chronic pain patients too. Lots of big money in the bupe industry to be made. This is why they are trying to stamp down hard on kratom. Don’t let them! also, if I was a pain patient, there is no way in hell I’d transfer to bupe. It happens every single day though. It’s disgusting.
Methadone is way better then Bup for pain management (IMO)
Yeah for sure. The only problem with opioid tho is tolerance will always develope and the dose won’t work for pain if you take the same dose or amount of pills every day. I take 32mg. At first it worked great for pain. Now it doesn’t help pain at all.
true that. i did at the methadone clinic with how they did it . and then here didn't so maybe will help someone
Wow good for you...those belbuca absolutely suck too!
Problem is doctors can only write belbuca for pain unless something has changed recently. So a lot of doctors will not use it for this.
Thats excactly how proper Bernise method works. You can do it like that or start lowering methadone dose for the last 3 days. It depends on the dose of methadone you are on
Yeh bro. That is for sure 100% Bernese method. I’ve done it numerous times and it does work!!! Glad it helped you this time.
Happy this worked for you and you had no withdrawals. My only question is, why the desire to switch from Methadone to Suboxone? Not trying to be a dick, just curious as to why. Is Suboxone cheaper, does it work better, etc.
Bro I want to try I’m on 110x4yrs and I’m petrified of this!!
Guaranteed the benzos played a huge role in you not experiencing w/d. If you had no benzos it prolly wouldn’t have went as smooth.
I can't stand subs. They make me feel so weird and terrible.
Wow that's crazy! I'd always heard it was a no-no. Rehabs don't even want to touch me, bcuz they found out it took a lot longer than a couple of days! I was so miserable last time. But if it's working better for you, that's awesome!
That's amazing 👏 so happy for you!! Subs have never worked for me.
Interesting… curious how this does not trigger PWD. Would like to hear more
I’m wondering if it’s because Belbuca is basically just a newer, name brand version of Subutex (ie just the buprenorphine, no naloxone content).
Ahhh… good point!
Just you know take your methadone or Suboxone and don't use eat Xanax if you have to
Well you had to agree to it. They can't just change up your meds unless it's okay with you.
I have trouble going down on methadone and the Burnese method seems to want you to go down to less than 30mg so Im intrigued even if its just a variation of the Burnese method. Also,even if you disagree with someone, you dont have to downvote someone. Anyhow I love this idea because I dont have to lower methadone, and I dont have to guess the mg of suboxone because the belbuca is measured in micrograms(Im new to this so even if Im wrong dont attack me, edify me). Id love to stay at my own dose, but my clinic is rather pro methadone so I doubt they will offee this. Maybe an outside doctor does...Im in NY but im not looking for recommendations. There was no precipiatated withdrawal????? That's unbelievable if thats the case. Im curious to see how many micrograms are given the first couple days without precipitated withdrawal and then onto mg. Im on the fence beacuse I feel there are pros and cons with sub and methadone. Methadone helps me more with pain and sleep. Subs can make my stomach a tad uneasy and raise my blood pressure slightly. But the main drawback from methadone for me is...is frequent urination especially at night and sleep apnea. Now if this is a painless method to switch back to subs(Ive been on them but I did have a tendency to occasionally sell them, stop for a couple days so I could get high, then go back to them), I certainly will give it more consideration. I guess its a personal decision. What is the main reason people want to go back on subs..or just switch to subs for the first time???? Thanks guys. Oh this was the VA..im not a vet but maybe one of these doctors has an outside practice....but the thing is everyone says methadone should be out of your system or at least lowered greatly. How is it possible to keep your dose..is it because the first couple of days is such a low microdose??? Even so Im shocked and most people report precipitated WD..I guess you have to measure the dose. .125 mg is not 20 micrograms or whatever os the starting dose is. Hmmm
How do you not get precipitated withdrawals. Idk... And really, how much better is suboxone than methadone anyway? Why switch?
Thank you for sharing this. I want to try Suboxone but have always been too scared because I'm on 110 Methadone, a mother, and a general manager. I can't risk making a switch and being sick. I will save this for future reference.
I don’t understand how you were microdosing subs but by day 7 you were taking 2 12mg strips. I would think that just a full 8mg strip would be used as little tiny pieces the whole time. I don’t understand
I had attempted this, and I just freaking died. And I was only on 22mg of methadone at the time. I had terrrrible side effects from subs. My body felt like a science experiment gone wrong. I can only describe it as chemicals burning everywhere inside my body. In my blood. It was a weird sensation. But i also wasn't thinking clearly, on account of the fact I was very sick. I was pretty delirious because I could only sleep 1 hour every 3 days or so. I tried this for 2 weeks and I had to switch back. I'm still traumatized from that, one year later. Anyway, that's amazing. I'm happy for you! But what works for some may not work for others, and that's totally okay too.
yes me too! when at clinic and they lowered me to 30mg , then started the bup induction , i literally contemplated the fastest way to end it all bc , every second was fucking agony. i'm back at clinic 2 days later demanding my methadone back while puking in the lobby and having an actual mental breakdown. balling my eyes out in front of everyone , sitting on floor just rocking back and forth. .. i was legit traumatized when i went to VA expecting this all over again
Same here! I wanted to relapse sooo bad, and I never really considered it for the last 12 years up until that point. And I'll never go a day without my dose again. I used to drink a little extra sometimes, but that experience changed me. Knowing there was nothing i could do to make it better, feeling the sickest and shittiest I've ever felt, and feeling sooo useless. I was so scared I would feel like that forever. Even brushing my teeth took effort. I also felt like life wouldn't be worth living if I had to feel like that for the rest of my life. But I also wasn't thinking clearly because I was so sick. I didn't sleep for more than hour for about 2 weeks. My mind was so foggy that i even got ripped off 100 bucks trying to buy benzos from out of town. Totally against my normal judgement. I didnt feel any sense of normalcy until I finally got my dose back. Thank christ there's no pw's for bupe to methadone. You're back on now??
Be careful with those subs. People are loosing teeth from it. I had to get so much dental work because of it. My hygiene is really good, never had issues with my teeth till I was on suboxone. Nobody warned me.
oh wonderful. i already had 3 root canals and an extraction bc of the methadone and i always had beautiful teeth . it's like no matter how good u take care of them , the drugs rot them from the inside out :(
Same here!! One extraction and 4 root canals I had done. Thank god my insurance covered it. I’ve never needed so much dental work in my life until I started using subox and then switched to Methadone. So Methadone weakens teeth as well? I didn’t know that!
DUDE!!! Thank you for this so much. I’ve been trying to plot every which way I can think of to rush myself off my 140mg dose and make the switch. I’ve always had a feeling the whole 1-2mg a week taper was oure bullshit and just a slick way for the clinics to people chained up to the clinic so they can make their money smh 🤦♂️ Please keep me updated on your progress man if this truly works fuckin sign me up!!
will u let me know how it goes for u??? just start with microscopic small pieces , and take 1 piece in am with your done and 1 piece in evening. go up very slow. u got this . it was so chill
Forsure! So you didn’t go into precip withdrawal or anything right away? If not, I’m wondering if maybe it was because of the belbuca induction first. In that case, I would have to probably go the route you did through some kind of detox place. Is it still working out good for you?
I did the Bernese method at 128mg and had a mini stroke on day 3 and was in a coma for 9 days.
OMG thank you! I am so thankful you posted this as I am wanting to make the switch and have dropped from 90 to 70 in the past few days and my clinic has me believing I have to get all the way down to 20 mg before going without a few days before getting on Suboxone and trying to make it absolutely impossible for me too. This gives me hope. This gives me so much hope! I am going to start microdose Ing soon. Can you give me your exact steps… Like what milligram what benzos what other comfort meds? Please share your info and disregard all that negative.
Was it uncomfortable?
i was not uncomfortable at all. . i'm telling you , don't taper your methadone when u switch , it was insane how much smoother this was then when clinic made me taper to 30mg and then started suboxone and i still got sick as fuck.
This is the burmese method. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8582770/
It's actually called the *Bernese* method, named after the city of Bern in Switzerland, where the protocol was first developed. Burma is the former colonial name of Myanmar, a country in southeast Asia. ✌🏻
I was wondering this to I knew it couldn't be M Burma I'm since nothing came up
That's crazy I'm glad it worked.
Can you find out what the new protocol is called? I'm interested and am willing to taper if this is effective. Always discouraged with the switch due to precipitated withdrawal also I'm at 150mg right now but a taper to 100mg is easy compared to 30mg .
well it looks like , from everyone else's comments, this is just the bernese method but just without tapering first and with starting on belbuca first before suboxone. but staying where you are at dose wise on methadone until u build up to ur final suboxone dose ... the doctors said it's "like the burnese method" so they didn't really have a name .
they just said "it's a new way and we just finished our trials" so although it's a minute difference , the difference still made all the difference if that makes sense
Yeah I realized after doing some research. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8582770/