Hi Jane, the best alternative medicine is methadone., as it is also a long-lasting opioid (long half-life).
Or, you could discuss buprenorphine patches. I checked in your earlier post and you wrote you take 0.6mg (sometimes 0.8mg) in sublingual tablets daily. I’ll have to check for equivalent dosing.
You current dose of 0,6 mg tablets corresponds to 50mg morphine. In a buprenorphine patch (look low in the chart at BuTrans patch) an equivaltent dose would be a 7d patch of 20mcg/h.
I hope this helps! Talk to your gp and to your pharmacist. If your pharmacist is more accessible, let her/him phone to the gp practice, as this is about medicines and pharmacists know more than gps about it.
Thanks Jools. Yes Lotte has mentioned. Ive ust called the pharmacy team at the surgery, suggesting.I've always been a bit unsure as I've heard they don't last the time expected.
I have a small stash for emergencies thank the Lord or which ever higher being. (Apart from youha!) Is helping out there.
Hi Jane, the morphine amount is used as a standard. Every other type of opioid on the chart is compared to 10mg of morphine. I did the calculations for you. So the morphine is only a calculation step, and has nothing to do with taking morphine in real life.
If you print the list on the link I gave you and/or write down the link and give it to your pharmacist, they can do the calculation themselves.
Your 0.4mg daily buprenorphine dose corresponds to 32 mg morphine. In turn, 32 mg morphine corresponds to 15mcg/h buprenorphine patches. They don’t list this amount on the chart, but I know it exists.
I take 5mcg/h patches. Provided I have the Teva or Mylan brand they work mostly 7d a week, thus don’t run out early. But it is good to know that patches CAN run out early.
Again, talk to your pharmacist and see if you can get patches. And if you get them, just see how they work for you. If they indeed run out early you should discuss with your pharmacist and try different brands. If the problem remains, ‘staggering’ the patches like Jools described most likely help. It does require that your doctor and pharmacist are willing to prescibe the dosing as more frequently than once a week.
It's called MME or morphine milligram equivalent and is used to compare the value of opioids. Google 'MME'. Google will return an app for the calculations.
This is outrageous. It happened once in London and I called around every chemist within 3 miles and they simply asked for my NHS number and managed to get Buprenorphine from another supplier
Switching to Oxycontin won't help as they work differently. Methadone is the nearest equivalent.
I'm in the US and routinely get methadone as my RLS opioid. But it seems like in the UK such a thing is strictly "verboten". Does anyone here know why?
So you mean why is methadone verboten?I know a UK hospital that routinely prescribes methadone for their MS patients with RLS.
So it can be prescribed here, but most GPs aren't allowed to prescribe it. It has to be prescribed by specialists usually and not many know more than the basics of RLS.
hello I had only been able to access the sandoz brand of buprenorohine which doesn’t work as well for me as the other brands so I have been ringing around the local pharmacies each month to get the accord brand. It takes ages and is exhausting but I have been able to get the accord brand this way. Your gp should be abke to give you a paper prescription so you can shop around . I hope this helps.
Thanks for responding DrlsYes. I could do that and have the in the past. I don't have access to a car and unfortunately I suffer from ME/CFS now so pretty much housebound.
So, It's not something I have the energy for. And the idea of shuffling into old age with this monthly 'task' would break my the heart.
My chemist issue Buprenorphine in the Temgesic brand usually. Not sure if you have tried that and notice any difference? Same core ingredients.
I fully understand Jane it is exhausting and I dont really have the energy or capacity for it either - I found that temgesic made me have withdrawal symptoms since it isn’t as long lasting - I really hope you can access the right medication - you shouldn’t be having to worry about this in your situation - its so ironic that you need to be fit and healthy to access health services / get the best treatment in the uk! Even getting a gp appointment requires maximum energy and resources - best wishes Dawn
In America Oxycodone is approved by the FDA for treating RLS. Making it a popular choice. Oxycodone and methadone are schedul2 narcotics and stringent controlled. Buprenorphine is a schedule3 narcotic and easier to prescribe. Buprenorphine has characteristics roughly equal to methadone. Methadone is used by half of rls patients on low dose opioid therapy. 25% use buprenorphine. The dopamine agonist were recently removed from recommended list. I think we are seeing a shift away from dopamine agonist and toward gabapentin and low dose opioids.
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