this post was submitted on 25 Oct 2026
19 points (85.2% liked)

No Stupid Questions

50326 readers
876 users here now

No such thing. Ask away!

!nostupidquestions is a community dedicated to being helpful and answering each others' questions on various topics.

The rules for posting and commenting, besides the rules defined here for lemmy.world, are as follows:

Rules (interactive)


Rule 1- All posts must be legitimate questions. All post titles must include a question.

All posts must be legitimate questions, and all post titles must include a question. Questions that are joke or trolling questions, memes, song lyrics as title, etc. are not allowed here. See Rule 6 for all exceptions.



Rule 2- Your question subject cannot be illegal or NSFW material.

Your question subject cannot be illegal or NSFW material. You will be warned first, banned second.



Rule 3- Do not seek mental, medical and professional help here.

Do not seek mental, medical and professional help here. Breaking this rule will not get you or your post removed, but it will put you at risk, and possibly in danger.



Rule 4- No self promotion or upvote-farming of any kind.

That's it.



Rule 5- No baiting or sealioning or promoting an agenda.

Questions which, instead of being of an innocuous nature, are specifically intended (based on reports and in the opinion of our crack moderation team) to bait users into ideological wars on charged political topics will be removed and the authors warned - or banned - depending on severity.



Rule 6- Regarding META posts and joke questions.

Provided it is about the community itself, you may post non-question posts using the [META] tag on your post title.

On fridays, you are allowed to post meme and troll questions, on the condition that it's in text format only, and conforms with our other rules. These posts MUST include the [NSQ Friday] tag in their title.

If you post a serious question on friday and are looking only for legitimate answers, then please include the [Serious] tag on your post. Irrelevant replies will then be removed by moderators.



Rule 7- You can't intentionally annoy, mock, or harass other members.

If you intentionally annoy, mock, harass, or discriminate against any individual member, you will be removed.

Likewise, if you are a member, sympathiser or a resemblant of a movement that is known to largely hate, mock, discriminate against, and/or want to take lives of a group of people, and you were provably vocal about your hate, then you will be banned on sight.



Rule 8- All comments should try to stay relevant to their parent content.



Rule 9- Reposts from other platforms are not allowed.

Let everyone have their own content.



Rule 10- Majority of bots aren't allowed to participate here. This includes using AI responses and summaries.



Credits

Our breathtaking icon was bestowed upon us by @Cevilia!

The greatest banner of all time: by @TheOneWithTheHair!

founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
 

I started thinking about this cause I'm currently going through kratom withdrawal myself, which is an opioid receptor agonist. I'm basically going through a very mild version of opioid withdrawal, which is certainly manageable, but not pleasant, with its flu-like symptoms.


So, opioid use disorder used to be (and still is) a huge problem in some countries. The stronger and commonly abused opioids, like heroin, morphine and fentanyl, as I understand it, are extremely addicting, but I'm no expert on this subject.

What I don't get tho...is for opioid use disorder, doctors prescribe methadone? Another synthetic opioid? Why? I'm genuinely curious.
From a quick Wikipedia read, it seems that methadone does cause addiction itself and withdrawal is actually longer than other opioids, that are used recreationally. Are the withdrawal symptoms less severe? Is it an effective form of treatment? I really do not know and I'm quite curious.

If someone had personal experience to share, that would probably be best.
But my question is basically: Methadone? Why the fuck do they prescribe that for opioid use disorder?

Sorry for the stupid question, I'm not very well educated on this subject and also really curious.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[โ€“] litchralee@sh.itjust.works 6 points 15 hours ago* (last edited 15 hours ago) (1 children)

My pharmacology knowledge is basically non-existent, but I understand two things: 1) clinical addiction is a physiological dependency and can only be effectively treated through physiological means, and 2) in general, step-down treatment is a valid and more effective approach than total withdrawal.

Those two points taken together, I believe methadone scratches the same physiological itch that other opioids do, but without as many side effects. And if those side effects are more biological (eg causes vomiting or high blood pressure; idk) than physiological, then a treatment plan can include conventional medications to treat those side effects. Overall, the complex problem of opioid treatment is transformed into a smaller, manageable problem, which doctors know how to tackle.

Is it not-great that methadone is still in the family of opioids? Yes, but my concern is more about availability in some countries: in places that heavily restrict all opioids without regard for therapeutic uses, this can result in the unavailability of methadone to treat opioid addiction, something that otherwise has a wealth of research supporting its use for that purpose.

I believe methadone scratches the same physiological itch that other opioids do, but without as many side effects

Overall, the complex problem of opioid treatment is transformed into a smaller, manageable problem, which doctors know how to tackle.

I see...that actually makes a lot of sense and it's well-put. I guess I'm kinda starting to get it...
Thanks!