The Legislative Committee on Administrative rules unanimously approved on Thursday an emergency rule designed to prevent opiate addiction treatment clinics from closing on short notice, leaving patients without treatment.
The rule comes in the wake of the closure of Synergy Counseling Group, a South Burlington clinic which closed with three days notice on April 28. The closure left 170 opiate dependent patients without prescribing physicians for medications used for addiction treatment, including Buprenorphine. The Department of Health’s Alcohol and Drug Abuse Programs and the Department of Vermont Health Access intervened along with HowardCenter, a Burlington-based organization that provides mental health and drug treatment services.
The state asked HowardCenter to restore services to patients. The nonprofit took over Synergy’s property lease and reconnected utilities to get the abandoned clinic back on line.
Bob Bick, director of mental health and substance abuse services for HowardCenter, said the Synergy staff stayed on through the changes, allowing patients to remain with the center. Bick said HowardCenter board felt obliged to act when Department of Health officials approached them. After Synergy dissolved, the clinic was renamed Twin Oaks Counseling.
“We are, by mission, committed to the clinic population … so we felt an absolute obligation to engage with the state to find a solution,” said Bick.
Without help from HowardCenter, said Jackie Corbelly at ADAP, things could have been much worse for the 170 people who had been under the care of Synergy.
“There was a potential for crisis,” she said, “but we didn’t have to go down that road because HowardCenter stepped forward.”
The new rule, which was approved pending language that clarifies the use of these drugs is only to be used as a last resort for patients, will apply to all physicians and facilities treating more than 30 patients.
Currently, about 3,000 Vermonters are being treated with drug addiction medications, said Corbelly.
Bick said increased regulatory guidance of Buprenorphine practices could help make addiction treatments more effective, as it would make it easier for physicians to transition patients between methadone and Buprenorphine if necessary for their treatment.
