Validation and implementation of the Australian Treatment Outcomes Profile in specialist drug and alcohol settings.

Introduction And Aims: The measurement of clinical outcomes is an important, but lacking, component of drug and alcohol treatment in Australia. This study aimed to psychometrically validate the Treatment Outcomes Profile under Australian conditions, examining implementation and feasibility issues in three public opioid treatment program clinics in NSW.

Design And Methods: The Treatment Outcomes Profile was modified to reflect Australian conditions and re-named the Australian Treatment Outcomes Profile (ATOP).

The acceptability, safety, and tolerability of methadone/naloxone in a 50:1 ratio.

Methadone is an effective therapy for heroin addiction, but the public health benefits are compromised by diversion and injection of prescribed methadone. Combination with naloxone is one way to reduce the risk of diversion and injection. Two studies were conducted.

Optimising the benefits of unobserved dose administration for stable opioid maintenance patients: follow-up of a randomised trial.

Background: The registration of combination buprenorphine/naloxone, a formulation designed to reduce risk of diversion, has led some Australian jurisdictional authorities to allow treatment without direct observation of dosing for stable, opioid-dependent patients.

Aim: To compare two approaches (1) initiating treatment with observed dosing, then allowing patients who demonstrate stability to change to unobserved dosing; or (2) initiating patients with unobserved dosing, subsequently requiring those who fail to stabilize to change to observed treatment.

Methods: This study builds on an RCT comparing efficacy of observed and unobserved treatment at 3 months.

A randomized trial of effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of observed versus unobserved administration of buprenorphine-naloxone for heroin dependence.

Aims: To compare the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of unobserved versus observed dosing of patients seeking treatment of heroin dependence.

Design: Randomized controlled trial and cost-effectiveness analysis. Setting Specialist out-patient drug treatment centres in Australia.

A comparison of buprenorphine treatment in clinic and primary care settings: a randomised trial.

Objective: To compare outcomes, costs and incremental cost-effectiveness of heroin detoxification performed in a specialist clinic and in general practice.

Design And Setting: Randomised controlled trial set in a specialist outpatient drug treatment centre and six office-based general practices in inner city Sydney, Australia.

Participants: 115 people seeking treatment for heroin dependence, of whom 97 (84%) were reinterviewed at Day 8, and 78 (68%) at Day 91.