VOA常速英语:Researchers Seek More Ways to Treat Opioid Addiction

With an estimated two and a half million Americans addicted to prescription opioids and heroin,medical intervention is increasingly important in responding to the epidemic.The most commonly prescribed treatment is buprenorphine - naloxone often administered to treat a narcotic overdose in an emergency situation,however, it has opioidlike effects and the potential for abuse.In contrast, the drug naltrexone marketed as Vivitrol blocks the effects of opioids, but patients must be completely off opiates to start taking it.The two drugs are used in very different ways.
据估计，大约有250万美国人沉迷于处方类鸦片类药物和海洛因，医疗干预对应对这一流行病越来越重要。最常用的治疗是丁丙诺啡纳-洛酮治疗，经常用在在麻醉剂过量的急救治疗中，然而，它有类鸦片效应和潜在的滥用现象。相反，药物纳曲酮比如Vivitrol类药物能阻挡类鸦片效应，但患者必须完全戒除鸦片制剂后才能开始服用。这两种药物的用途非常不同。

Naltrexone is a opiate blocker and so it’s used after people have gotten off opiates so-called after-detox and then want to maintain a opiate-free state using naltrexone to help them.And then buprenorphine is used in more of a maintenance model where people switch without fully detoxing from a unhealthy opioid say heroin to buprenorphine which can be taken on a daily basis and then maintained for months and months in terms of long-term recovery.
纳曲酮是阿片受体阻断剂，所以它在患者已停止鸦片制剂后，也就是所谓排毒后使用，然后如果他们想继续保持远离鸦片状态的话，就要使用使用纳曲酮来帮助他们。而丁丙诺啡是在患者还没有排毒完全的状态下作为维持剂使用的，患者还存在类鸦片制剂的滥用，比如海洛因，这时候需要一步一步地使他们先停止服用海洛因，把丁丙诺啡作为毒品的替代品，假以时日使患者有一个长期的恢复。

Joshua Lee and colleagues at New York University’s School of Medicine led a study to compare the two therapies.A group of 570 opioid dependent adults who were still trying to kick their heroin habit in detox were given either a daily oral dose of buprenorphine while in treatment or six-monthly injections of naltrexone after completing treatment.
乔舒亚李和纽约大学医学院的同事组织了了一项研究来比较这两种疗法。一组人数为570人的类鸦片依赖患者，他们仍试图用排毒法戒除海洛因，他们将在治疗中或者每日服用丁丙诺啡维持剂，或者六个月中每月治疗完成后接受纳曲酮注射。

Over the course then of six months, about the same amount of people that had started, did okay in terms of avoiding opiate relapse and kind of surviving on treatment doing reasonably well in terms of traditional outpatient opiate treatment goals.
在六个月的时间里，两组人数几乎相等的患者在避免毒品反复上瘾的方面做的还算可以，就传统的门诊病人戒毒目标来看，可以说这种疗法真的做得不错。

One caveat, a full 25% of people scheduled to take naltrexone were not able to complete detox so weren’t able to get the shots while only 6% of the other study group were unable to start their daily dose of buprenorphine. The researchers hope they’re finding that the medications are equally safe and effective encourages clinics to expand their treatment offerings and save lives.
值得注意的是，有百分之二十五本应接受纳曲酮治疗的患者因排毒环节没有坚持下来而无法接受纳曲酮注射，而另一实验组中，只有百分之六的患者放弃坚持每日服用丁丙诺啡。研究人员希望他们发现这些药物都能安全有效，进而鼓励诊所扩大治疗范围，挽救生命。

I’m Faith Lapidus, VOA News.
VOA新闻，Faith Lapidus为您报道。