A treatment crisis: cocaine use by clients in methadone maintenance programs

We surveyed 11 methadone maintenance treatment programs in the Baltimore, Maryland, area to examine cocaine use among their 2414 clients and the methods employed to cope with that use. The percent of clients with at least one urine sample positive for cocaine during the month previous to study was 15.7% (379/2414) and ranged from 5.9% to 33.0% among the 11 programs. We determined the programs' use of monitoring strategies, treatment services, and administrative controls. We discuss the policy implications of our findings for methadone maintenance programs' efforts to address cocaine use with particular regard to the epidemic of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) among intravenous drug users, their sexual partners, and offspring.