What Is Suboxone?

0:00What is Suboxone?

0:10I'm going to tell you.

0:11I'm Dr. Rodriguez from Healing Sky.

0:13I'm also the medical director of the Daray Center for Healing and I'll tell you what

0:18Suboxone is.

0:19Suboxone is a medication that is FTA approved for the treatment of opioid dependence.

0:25It is based off of buprenorphine, which is an agonist antagonist at the mu opioid receptor.

0:32That is the main receptor that is also implicated in the use of heroin and pain medications.

0:39What this medication does is it binds to the receptor and it has a partial agonist effect.

0:47What that means is that it will have a positive effect as in relieving and alleviating opioid

0:54withdrawal symptoms.

0:55It'll even have some pain relieving properties and it will suppress opioid cravings.

1:01Now the partial antagonism factors in when somebody takes too much buprenorphine it will

1:07become an antagonist meaning it will work in the opposite direction having a negative

1:13effect on the brain and in this case it will induce either opioid withdrawal symptoms

1:19or at a minimum it will prevent an opioid overdose.

1:24This makes buprenorphine and thus Suboxone a very safe medication to use even when treating

1:30somebody with addiction.

1:32It is difficult to overdose on unless you mix it with something else.

1:37It is very effective in treating opioid dependence so if you have an issue with opioid dependence

1:42I would highly recommend giving this medication a try.

1:46It is truly the standard of care in treating opioids.

1:49If you find this information helpful there's a lot more of it on Healing Sky.

1:54You can follow me on Healing Sky and look for my podcast as well.

1:58Thank you.