Adherence to HIV Therapy in Heroin Addicts: Oral vs XR-NTX
Status:
Completed
Trial end date:
2016-12-01
Target enrollment:
Participant gender:
Summary
Substance use, particularly the compulsive behaviors associated with addiction, lead to
unhealthy behaviors including non-adherence to antiretroviral therapy (ART) and treatment
failure. High on the list of disorders leading to non-adherence is heroin addiction as a wide
range of impulsive, high-risk behaviors accompanies it. The science of adherence would be
improved by developing new methods to prevent relapse to heroin addiction, especially methods
that can be used in settings that are not limited by the aims to test such a method using an
implantable naltrexone formulation (IN) that is approved in Russia and blocks opioid effects
for 3 months. The efficacy of the IN should be better than oral naltrexone (ON) because it
does not depend on daily behavior to take a tablet and maintains a constant plasma level for
months, which should result in sustained blockade, less relapse, and better ART adherence and
treatment response.