New Chapters Join NAMA Recovery

National Alliance for Medication Assisted Recovery
Press Release
Contact Person: Joycelyn Woods, Executive Director
edirector@methadone.org
1.212.595.6262


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 2, 2009

New Chapters Join NAMA Recovery

The National Alliance for Medication Assisted Recovery, or NAMA Recovery, formerly the National Alliance of Methadone Advocates, with 25 chapters across the United States and 15 international affiliate chapters from England to Denmark and India to Australia, is proud to announce the formation of its 26th and 27th chapters in the United States. They are Northern Texas NAMA-Recovery under the guidance of co-directors Terry and Dianne Cox and Georgia NAMA Recovery with Suboxone as Specialty under the leadership of director Angela Fletcher.

The establishment of the Georgia chapter is a particular milestone for NAMA Recovery as it extends its umbrella to include patients accessing medication assisted recovery through the use of buprenorphine, currently prescribed under the trade name Suboxone. It is the newest of the medications approved by the federal government for the treatment of opiate addiction.

Each of these new chapters can be reached through the NAMA Recovery website at http://www.methadone.org/.

The National Alliance for Medication Assisted Recovery, established in 1988, is the premier patient advocacy organization in the opioid addiction recovery community. It provides information, education and advocacy support to patients in medication assisted addiction treatment world-wide.

Profiles of Recovery Advocacy in Action

Advocacy for Medication-Assisted Recovery

An interview with Walter Ginter by Bill White

"In June of 2009, I interviewed Walter Ginter about the work he and others have done in advocating the legitimacy and effectiveness of medication-assisted recovery. Walter is one of the most skilled recovery advocates in the United States."

Check out the rest of the interview at the FAVOR website.

New Education Series "Making Methadone Safe"

A new Education Series (Number 11) Making Methadone Safe has been developed to help patients -- both addiction treatment patients and pain patients -- keep their methadone safe.

Increase in Methadone Related Deaths by 390%

Methadone related deaths have increased dramatically, from 1999 through 2004 there was a 390 percent increase. Other deaths attributed to opioids have also increased but only by 90 percent, however they constitute a much larger percentage of the total for opioid-related deaths. A SAMHSA report found that the majority of methadone-related deaths involve abuses that were prescribed for pain management. Methadone deaths attributed to Opiate Treatment Programs (OTPs) have not increased.

Unfortunately it is the OTP deaths that make the news and methadone programs have particularily become targets because they are easy to blame.

It is important that all persons taking methadone keep there medication safe and this Education Series was developed to provide resources and ways to keep methadone safe.

You can download the new Education Series at our website.

New Name: National Alliance for Medication Assisted Recovery

National Alliance of Methadone Advocates
Press Release

Contact Person: Joycelyn Woods, Executive Director
edirector@methadone.org
1.212.595.6262

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
APRIL 26, 2009

New Name: National Alliance for Medication Assisted Recovery

It is especially fitting at this AATOD conference in New York that the Board of Directors of the National Alliance of Methadone Advocates, the premier patient advocacy organization in the opiate addiction recovery community, established in 1988 in this very city, announces an important change to its identity. It will now be doing business as the National Alliance for Medication Assisted Recovery, or NAMA Recovery. NAMA Recovery has 25 chapters across the United States and 15 international affiliate chapters from England to Denmark and India to Australia, providing information, education and advocacy support to patients in medication assisted addiction treatment utilizing methadone and buprenorphine.

NAMA Recovery is the umbrella organization for the M.A.R.S. Project, a CSAT (Center for Substance Abuse Treatment) funded Recovery Support Services Grant grantee. M.A.R.S. (Medication Assisted Recovery Services) is a peer recovery project based on the belief that when methadone patients receive training about addiction, its treatment and recovery they will feel better about themselves and do better in treatment and life. It is providing patients of medication assisted treatment education about the science of addiction, information on nutrition and health, peer mentoring, women- and Hispanic-specific recovery services, even a M.A.R.S. book club, all in a location near the treatment clinic where the patient can be mentored and grow. M.A.R.S. is the first truly “peer to peer” recovery endeavor in opiate addiction treatment in the United States with MAT patients educating and mentoring MAT patients with significant accomplishments and successes.

The Executive Director of NAMA Recovery is Joycelyn Woods and the Director of the M.A.R.S. Project is Walter Ginter.

Rokki's NewTube Message

See our President Rokki Baker's NewTube message about Drug Policy.

The message was taped at the IDUD 2008 Meetings hosted by NAMA’s Danish Affiliate, BrugerForeningen (BF).

Check out Rokki's Talk at YouTube.

Editorial Comment: AATODs Letter to Treatment Magazine

January 9, 2009


Ted Jackson Editor and Publisher
Treatment Magazine
Post Office Box 3 196
Lantana, Florida 33465

Dear Mr. Jackson:

I am writing with regard to the "Publisher's Note," "Another Use for Methadone?!!," which was published in the November 2, 2008 edition of Treatment Magazine.

You note that methadone is "...one of the most studied drugs on earth. "It would be helpful for you to read some of the literature because you would find that there is absolutely no scientific evidence that supports the statement that methadone " ...rots your teeth." It is useful to cite a statement from the National Institutes of Health Consensus Statement of November 1997.

"Many of the barriers to effective use of methadone maintenance Treatment in the treatment of opioid dependence stem from misperceptions and stigmas attached to opioid dependence the people who are addicted those who treat them and the settings in which services are provided."

An impartial observer might conclude that your "Publisher's Note" further stigmatized this long-proven and effective treatment for opioid addiction. The Association welcomes the expansion of buprenorphine medication and an increasing number of opioid treatment programs are using buprenorphine products in addition to methadone to treat chronic opioid addiction. With regard to methadone being antiquated, you should know that there is a major expansion in the use of this medication to treat chronic opioid addiction in Europe, China and Vietnam with an interest to use this medication in other developing nations.

You also indicate that "...the principal use for methadone is as a maintenance replacement for other opiates." This has been the case for the past four decades to present, there are approximately 260,000 patients being treated with methadone in 1,203 registered and certified OTPs. There are more than 700,000 patients who receive prescriptions for methadone from private physicians in treating chronic pain.

After years of struggling to support rigorous scientific evaluations of medications and to promote evidence-based treatment for opioid addiction, it is extremely disheartening to have the publisher of a treatment magazine for the addiction industry make such unfounded comments.

Sincerely yours,


Mark W. Parrino, MPA
President