When three graduate students at the University of Maine began researching Suboxone prescribers last fall, they didn’t yet realize they were stepping into a political ruckus.
Social work students Mikala Thompson, Alaina Crowley and Daniel Cohen wanted to know how many doctors in the state prescribed the medication, used to treat opioid addiction. A Belfast health center that offered the drug asked the students to find out, by contacting all of the 100-plus doctors on a government list, Thompson said. The students hoped to provide the state with updated contact information for the doctors.
They began planning the research project last September, she said. Three months later, Gov. Paul LePage’s proposal to eliminate state funding for methadone treatment in favor of Suboxone began grabbing headlines. Suddenly the question the students sought to answer — how many doctors in Maine prescribe Suboxone? — was on policymakers’ minds.
More specifically, are there enough doctors to handle a wave of former methadone patients switching to Suboxone under the governor’s budget plan?
The LePage administration maintains the state has the capacity to accommodate those patients.
In February, Thompson and her fellow students holed up in a room, divvied up the list, and hit the phones with a script, she said. At that time, 105 Maine doctors were identified as Suboxone prescribers on the registry, which fluctuates as physicians become certified to offer the medication. The students discovered a few more unlisted prescribers as they asked doctors for referrals and searched online, bringing the total to 112. (Doctors can choose to be omitted from the public list).
Forty-three doctors, less than half those listed, confirmed that they prescribed Suboxone, the students found. Almost as many, 42, confirmed they’d stopped prescribing it. Another 27 failed to respond, she said.
“It was really amazing that just over a third of the people that we contacted … could say, ‘No we’re not prescribing Suboxone,’” Thompson said.
The students found only two Suboxone prescribers in Aroostook County.
“Rural Maine does not have the infrastructure” to take on thousands of new Suboxone patients, Thompson said.
The students also sent a survey to the 43 doctors who confirmed prescribing the medication, hoping to learn more about their services, but only 14 responded, she said. With the poor response rate, it remains unclear how many of those physicians are taking new Suboxone patients.
