Eight-in-10 methadone patients use cannabis

MORE than eight-in-10 drug users who are on methadone to wean them off heroin continue to use cannabis, and some also use cocaine regularly, according to new research.

A study of multi-drug use among methadone-treated patients of the Health

Service Executive (HSE), North Dublin, found:

Of more than three-quarters of methadone patients with a history of cocaine use, more than one-third had used it within the last month.

12% of methadone users were also using cocaine daily.

More than four-in-10 were using cannabis daily and two-in-10 were using it once or twice a week.

A significant proportion of participants with a high frequency of cocaine use was also using cannabis on a daily basis.

Over 70% of the participants were receiving a medium to high daily dose of methadone.

Tony Geoghegan, director of the Merchant's Quay Project, a voluntary organisation providing services for the homeless and drug users, said the findings of the survey reflected the growing quantities of cocaine available.

"This is leading to increased levels of usage, evident in the growing number of cocaine seizures," he said.

Mr Geoghegan said there was also the worry that drug users who continued to use while on a methadone programme were jeopardising their recovery prospects.

"There is the possibility that it will have a destabilising effect on the treatment they are receiving. The findings of this survey are worrying and we need to look at why the methadone treatment programme is not meeting peoples' needs. Maybe it needs to be refocused," he said.

Zeibun Ramatoola, lecturer in Pharmaceutics at the Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland (RCSI), who headed up the survey, said further study was needed to measure the impact of continuing drug use by those on the methadone programme.

She also said: "We need to look at the provision of counselling services to these patients and also treatment of the psychiatric disorders which may result from polydrug usage (using a number of drugs)."

The survey of 851 methadone-treated patients entitled High Incidence of Polydrug Usage among Methadone Patients concluded cocaine abuse is emerging as a major problem among opiate users receiving methadone treatment, with a great majority of these patients also using cannabis on a daily basis.

Around 7,700 patients across the country are given methadone.

The survey also warned that despite its perception as a "safe drug", cannabis is known to have "both acute and chronic health effects and does produce dependence".

The findings of the survey will be presented today at RCSI Research Day 2006.