Three-year retention in buprenorphine treatment for opioid use disorder nationally in the Veterans Health...

Buprenorphine has become the major treatment for opioid use disorder (OUD) but data on long treatment term retention and its correlates are sparse.

All veterans with OUD treated in Veterans Health Administration (VHA) facilities nationally in fiscal year (FY) 2012, and who began treatment with buprenorphine as indicated by a first prescription after the first 60 days of the year were identified with the date of and their last prescription from FY 2012-2015. Veterans were classified into four groups based on time from first to last prescription: (0-30 days, 31-365 days; 1-3 years; and more than 3 years). These groups were compared on socio-demographic, diagnoses and service, and psychotropic drug use. Kaplan-Meier curves and Cox proportional hazards models were used to identify variables independently associated with retention in buprenorphine treatment.

Veterans newly started on buprenorphine (n = 3,151) were retained in treatment for a mean duration of 1.68 years (standard deviation [SD] 1.23), with 61.60% (n = 1,941) retained for more than a year and 31.83% (n = 1,003) for more than 3 years. Cox proportion hazards model showed that only black race (Hazards ratio [HR] 1.26; standard error [SE] .06; p.0003), the Charlson index (HR 1.03; SE .01; p.0132) and emergency room visits during FY 2012 (HR 1.03; SE .01; p < .0001) were the only available variables independently associated higher odds of buprenorphine discontinuation.

Buprenorphine retention was substantial among veterans treated in VHA, but few individual characteristics correlated with retention.

Future research focused on identifying further correlates of treatment retention is required to help devise interventions to improve treatment continuation. (Am J Addict 2017;26:572-580).