We had an incredibly busy season at the Coleman Institute for Addiction Medicine. We were challenged to keep staff and patients safe from COVID-19, navigate holiday schedules, and respond as best we can to the tsunami wave of people desperate for help from various...
These were not my words, but the words of a patient who completed a 5-day opioid detox with us a few weeks ago. A couple of years ago, his detox would probably have been 3 days—he believed he was using a gram or a gram and a half of heroin a day—but when fentanyl was...
Fred came for an implant yesterday. He detoxed off of street fentanyl 10 weeks ago. He was about a week late for his scheduled naltrexone implant and as the time drew closer to his return visit, he was getting antsy. An argument with his wife, who is rightfully having...
It doesn’t happen like this all the time. But it did happen yesterday. Room to room, patient to patient, over and over—I heard one success story after another. Mack, off fentanyl since mid-April. Sleeping well, doing home renovation projects he’d put off for...
This has become a very common scenario and patients from all around the country are calling the Coleman Institute for Addiction Medicine for help. It’s important to understand the difference between addiction and physical dependence. Addiction, at its simplest, can be...