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Can you imagine a deadly and persistent epidemic in the United States that physicians refuse to treat? It's unthinkable, yet that is what we have today with opiate addiction.

A highly effective medication called Suboxone (brand name), or buprenorphine (generic name) is available for this condition, but today patients can't find doctors who will prescribe it.

The reason I take the unusual step of pleading in a community newspaper for more of my colleagues to begin treating these patients is because such pleas in the medical literature are ignored. So why do physicians avoid prescribing this life-saving treatment?

I believe the main reason is that many physicians may feel — as I did when this treatment first was approved in 2002 — that we have been so poorly trained to manage addiction that we're not comfortable doing so. That's understandable, but its not really acceptable to leave it at that.

Such was the way I felt in 2006. I was well-trained and experienced in my field of family practice, but I knew little about this disease. Then, because I encountered so much opiate addiction in my practice, it was clear I had to act. My first few patients who started this medication learned along with me how they could control "addiction thinking" and how they could begin the (lifelong) work of recovery. As a result, I began to understand how treatable addiction is.

Addicts who are new to recovery knew as little as I did how to proceed, but we learned together. So I say to my physician colleagues, "If all people in recovery can learn how addiction thinking is controlled, and how recovery proceeds, you can too." Ideally, medical education should prepare physicians for this important area of practice but, so far, that has not happened. Still, physicians can learn along with patients.

Because this medication is so effective, patients and physicians can proceed in a leisurely fashion to work through the recovery process. (In the Massachusetts model of treatment, physician-prescribers delegate most of this recovery counseling to a non-physician helper. I personally have enjoyed doing part of the counseling myself with these patients). Also, medication must be supplemented with "12-step" type meetings, which make available the wisdom of people more experienced in the recovery process.

Suboxone (buprenorphine) has the unique effect of enabling patients to get sober overnight. No other treatment available in the past for any other drug addiction is so dramatically effective. In fact, some call it the "Lazarus" effect.

Physicians may have other reasons for not accepting these patients. We worry they won't pay us, or will offend in the waiting room, or be unlovable liars (like those addicts we've treated in the past at a time when they were under the influence). But addicts are just like anyone else when sober, and they're very used to paying for what they need. And there is a definite emotional payoff for physicians; there are no more grateful patients than these.

I have no commercial interest in promoting the sale of this drug. And I never thought I'd ever say the following, but here goes: "Please, ask your doctor if she's doing her share to treat the opiate epidemic with Suboxone (buprenorphine)."

My experience after a lifetime as a family practitioner is there is no more satisfying medical experience than helping a self-loathing, lying, lost addict begin the transformation of becoming a spouse, a parent, a worker — a normal human being again. We've never had a treatment like this before. It may well be true that no other intervention in all of medical practice reduces morbidity and mortality as effectively as treatment with Suboxone (buprenorphine).

Please, colleagues, join me in this work. If you'll commit to begin doing your part for this sorely needed treatment, then I'll commit to doing a long-postponed video on YouTube called "Tips for New Prescribers of Buprenorphine." Don't just treat a dozen or so, as most Suboxone prescribers do. And don't gouge these vulnerable patients with outrageous fees, as some of our colleagues do. I'm an ordinary family physician who has derived tremendous satisfaction from treating hundreds of these folks. Please join me. I'd be happy to talk with you if I can help you get started.

David A. Moore, M.D., certified as a family physician 37 years ago. He has also treated addiction the last 11 years in his private practice.