You’ll get your first dose at 10mg to 30mg per day for the first three days. If you’re a high-risk patient you’ll start at 10mg to 20mg. Your doses may be increased by 5mg to 15 mg every three to four days. During this time you are at risk of an overdose if you use other drugs or alcohol. Your body is getting adjusted to metabolizing the Methadone and you may feel some withdrawal symptoms.
Mortality rate of patients in Methadone programs is about 1.7 per 1000 patients. Almost all deaths occur in the first two weeks of treatment due to polydrug use (use of many drugs) and taking illegal Methadone. 92% of all deaths involved polydrug use. Of those 60% who died had consumed benzodiazepines. 30% of those who died had consumed alcohol. This underscores the fact that benzodiazepines increase the lethality of Methadone. The risk of overdose in the first two weeks is 6.7 times higher than that of heroin addicts not in treatment, and 98 times higher than patients on maintenance doses of Methadone. This underscores how important it is to avoid all illegal drug and alcohol use during the first two weeks of treatment.
You’ve entered what we call the late stabilization phase. At this point you’ll probably be taking between 50mg and 80mg of Methadone. You’ll be getting partial relief of withdrawal symptoms. Your body is still only partially tolerant to the Methadone in your system. Your dose might get adjusted every three to four days in the 5mg to 15mg range.
You’re in the maintenance phase. At this point your body is largely tolerant of Methadone. You should also experience no withdrawal symptoms at all most of the time.
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