Medical News Today -- An Article published Online First and in an upcoming Lancet shows that a once-monthly injection of extended-release naltrexone (XR-NTX) is an effective treatment for opioid dependence when compared with placebo. This is, say the authors, especially important in countries that, for whatever reason (political or financial), don’t have access to other therapies. But in a linked Comment written by an international team of six authors, the study is criticised, as is the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for having approved this treatment for use in heroin and prescription opioid addiction in October 2010. The Article is by Professor Evgeny Krupitsky, Department of Addictions, St Petersburg Bekhterev Psychoneurological Research Institute, Russia, and colleagues.
