Buprenorphine Approval by FDA

"Federal statute, the Drug Addiction Treatment Act of 2000 (DATA 2000), has established a new paradigm for the medication-assisted treatment of opioid addiction in the United States (Drug Addiction Treatment Act of 2000). Prior to the enactment of DATA 2000, the use of opioid medications to treat opioid addiction was permissible only in federally approved Opioid Treatment Programs (OTPs) (i.e., methadone clinics), and only with the Schedule II opioid medications methadone and levo-alpha-acetyl-methadol (LAAM), which could only be dispensed, not prescribed.* Now, under the provisions of DATA 2000, qualifying physicians in the medical office and other appropriate settings outside the OTP system may prescribe and/or dispense Schedule III, IV, and V opioid medications for the treatment of opioid addiction if such medications have been specifically approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for that indication. (The text of DATA 2000 can be viewed at http://www.buprenorphine.samh….) [NOTE: as of January 2019 that link was no longer valid. The new URL is https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/…]

"In October 2002, FDA approved two sublingual formulations of the Schedule III opioid partial agonist medication buprenorphine for the treatment of opioid addiction. These medications, Subutex® (buprenorphine) and Suboxone® (buprenorphine/naloxone), are the first and, as of this writing, the only Schedule III, IV, or V medications to have received such FDA approval and, thus, to be eligible for use under DATA 2000."