Stigma Against Methadone
The Stigma against Methadone Users and the Healthcare Providers Who Help Them
Abstract The purpose of this research is to identify a stigma against methadone users and those in the healthcare field who are trying to help them become drug free. Methadone is a synthetic drug brought to America in the 1960’s to help with opiate addiction. During the fifty years since then, it has been a very successful treatment drug, but a stigma has developed that to use this drug is to be considered a “junkie”. This is not the case; this paper will also discuss ways in which to educate about and overcome the stigma against those who work with or take methadone.
What is a Stigma? According to sociologist Erving Goffman, “a stigma refers to characteristics that discredit people… the stigma can become a person’s master status, defining him or her as deviant” (Henslin, 2012). Whether or not the accused person actually takes part the activities and behaviors the stigma depicts, they are still discredited, judged, and even ostracized because of others like them who do participate in the stigma’s behaviors. Anyone associated with a deviant behavior automatically gets grouped together, whether they take part in it or not, hence the stigma.
What is Methadone? Methadone is a man-made drug originally synthesized in Germany in 1937. Thirty years later, in the 1960’s, it was introduced to the United States as a treatment for drug addiction. Since then, for over fifty years, methadone has been used to help drug addicts get clean of opiates and regain stability; during that time, there has been no evidence that taking methadone for long periods of time causes damage to the body (Drug Policy Alliance, 2006).
The Drug Policy Alliance, an organization committed to identifying, acknowledging, and promoting health-centered alternatives to drugs (2011), supports the use of methadone to treat opiate addiction and states that when used appropriately and a proper dose is reached,
Abstract The purpose of this research is to identify a stigma against methadone users and those in the healthcare field who are trying to help them become drug free. Methadone is a synthetic drug brought to America in the 1960’s to help with opiate addiction. During the fifty years since then, it has been a very successful treatment drug, but a stigma has developed that to use this drug is to be considered a “junkie”. This is not the case; this paper will also discuss ways in which to educate about and overcome the stigma against those who work with or take methadone.
What is a Stigma? According to sociologist Erving Goffman, “a stigma refers to characteristics that discredit people… the stigma can become a person’s master status, defining him or her as deviant” (Henslin, 2012). Whether or not the accused person actually takes part the activities and behaviors the stigma depicts, they are still discredited, judged, and even ostracized because of others like them who do participate in the stigma’s behaviors. Anyone associated with a deviant behavior automatically gets grouped together, whether they take part in it or not, hence the stigma.
What is Methadone? Methadone is a man-made drug originally synthesized in Germany in 1937. Thirty years later, in the 1960’s, it was introduced to the United States as a treatment for drug addiction. Since then, for over fifty years, methadone has been used to help drug addicts get clean of opiates and regain stability; during that time, there has been no evidence that taking methadone for long periods of time causes damage to the body (Drug Policy Alliance, 2006).
The Drug Policy Alliance, an organization committed to identifying, acknowledging, and promoting health-centered alternatives to drugs (2011), supports the use of methadone to treat opiate addiction and states that when used appropriately and a proper dose is reached,
References: About methadone and buprenorphine (revised 2nd ed.). (2006). United States: Drug Policy Alliance. Drug Policy Alliance. (2011). Drug Policy Alliance. Retrieved March 29, 2012, from http://www.drugpolicy.org/ Henslin, J. M. (2012). Deviance and social control. Sociology: a down-to-earth approach (11th ed., p. 190). Boston: Pearson. Methadone patient advocacy movement gathers steam with federal grant. (2007). Alcoholism & Drug Abuse Weekly, 19(47), 1-3.