Medication Assisted Treatment

“Medication assisted treatment —a combination of psychosocial therapy and U.S. Food and Drug Administration-approved medication—is the most effective intervention to treat opioid use disorder and is more effective than either behavioral interventions or medication alone.” – Office of National Drug Control Policy

Medication Assisted Treatment Florida (MAT) for addiction is the use of medicine to block cravings and withdrawal symptoms together with counseling and behavioral therapy to achieve sustainable recovery. MAT is an evidence-based, proven, and effective addiction treatment that significantly increases the chances of long-term freedom from addiction for many people.

Drugs like fentanyl, oxycodone, and heroin are opioids that flood the brain with dopamine, a neurotransmitter that signals pleasure and triggers the brain to ask for more. For many people, the cycle turns into an addiction. For someone prone to addiction, the pleasure can seem more like euphoria, a sensation that the brain comes to crave. It takes more and more of the drug to attain a pleasurable state. After a while, the user needs to take the drug to just feel normal. Desire for the drug becomes an insatiable hunger that leads to impaired function and erratic, destructive behavior. The absence of the drug causes anxiety, depression, and a host of extremely uncomfortable physical withdrawal symptoms like fatigue, muscle cramps, nausea, and night sweats.

MAT works to break the cycle of addiction with prescription medication along with therapy and behavior modification techniques tailored to the individual. The medication stabilizes the brain chemistry by satisfying physiological cravings without triggering the euphoria effect. Absent the deleterious withdrawal symptoms and the rewarding pleasurable sensation, counseling and therapy are generally much more effective.

MAT is a cutting-edge “whole patient” therapy with demonstrated effectiveness for many people. Describing MAT as “high-quality, evidence-based care,” both the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Family Physicians state that “evidence shows medication-assisted detox works.”

“There are decades of research concluding MAT is more effective than most other forms of treatment, especially in the case of opioids,” according to experts. “For most people, the use of medications combined with psychosocial treatment is superior to drug or psychosocial treatment on its own.”

While there are a lot of treatment options available for people with substance abuse problems, MAT offers a more hopeful path than abstinence-based programs or drug substitution regimens alone. Florida Treatment Services has addiction recovery centers throughout Central Florida offering on-site dispensation of methadone, suboxone, and naltrexone.