Planning My Methadone Visits
Use this planner with your opioid treatment program to connect a workable visit schedule with a clear medication-safety plan. Keep the program’s written dosing instructions with these notes.
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Understand the visit plan
Methadone treats opioid use disorder by preventing withdrawal symptoms. Your program sets the dosing schedule for you. A visit plan should account for your health and response to treatment as well as transport, work and caregiving. Ask what happens onsite, what can be arranged elsewhere, and whom to contact between visits.
Take-home arrangements are individualized; another patient’s schedule does not establish yours. Ask the team to explain safe transport and storage, the current visit plan, and when it will be reviewed.
Sources: [2]
Safety before convenience
Keep these instructions in view
- Take only the prescribed amount. Do not add a dose because you feel uncomfortable or missed a visit. Contact the program for instructions about a missed or interrupted schedule; never double a dose.
- Report alcohol, other opioids, sedatives and all medicines or supplements. Some combinations can dangerously slow breathing. Do not abruptly stop a prescribed benzodiazepine on your own; ask the treating clinicians to coordinate the plan.
- Methadone can cause drowsiness. Do not drive until you know how it affects you. Arrange another ride if you feel impaired.
- Keep any take-home medicine in its original closed container, inaccessible to children and other people. Do not share it.
Sources: [2]
My confirmed visit and contact plan
- Program and dosing location
- Name, address, phone, operating days and the person who confirmed these details.
- Visit schedule and review date
- Copy the program’s instructions. Keep a separate record of any later change and who gave it.
- Travel and backup
- Usual ride, time needed, backup option, and whom to call before a travel problem becomes a missed visit.
- Costs and coverage still to confirm
- Medication, visits, tests, coverage/authorization, assistance and who will verify each answer.
- Missed visit, vomiting or interrupted treatment
- Record the program’s instructions and after-hours number; do not improvise a replacement dose.
- Medicine questions and symptoms to report
- List medicines/substances and concerns for the team; include unusual sleepiness or changes after a dose adjustment.
- Take-home storage and overdose response
- Where medicine will be kept, who cannot access it, where naloxone is kept and who knows how to use it.
Keep completed notes private. Share only what you choose with the people helping you. These are original educational and planning prompts, not a validated assessment.