Establishing a Relationship with a Pharmacy

You should establish a relationship with at least one local pharmacy before starting a buprenorphine practice to ensure that they can stock adequate supplies of buprenorphine.

Consider the following guidelines when contacting a pharmacy:

  • Verify any time requirements that you have if you need the prescription filled quickly. This is especially important during buprenorphine induction.
  • Specify that you will be prescribing the buprenorphine/naloxone combination tablet (Suboxone®), which is recommended for the vast majority of patients.
  • Verify that the pharmacy can fill prescriptions quickly; this is especially important during induction when patients will visit the pharmacy to pick up single doses of buprenorphine.
  • Ask the pharmacists if they are familiar with buprenorphine treatment and dispensing the medication and, if not, refer them to some educational materials.
  • Ask the pharmacists to contact you to alert you if the patient is filling prescriptions for other controlled substances, requesting early refills, behaving inappropriately, claiming to have lost prescriptions, etc.

On a related note, you should have all patients sign a pharmacy consent form and keep this on file in case the pharmacy requires it for communications about the patient.



Related Resources: 
Local Resource Finder
Description: 
Search tool where a patient or physician can enter their zipcode and receive a listing of the closest buprenorphine counselors, pharmacies, treatment facilities, and support groups.
Source: 
The National Alliance of Advocates for Buprenorphine Treatment (NAABT)
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