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Home > Treatment > Technical Review Reports on Opioid Treatment in Maine

Technical Review Report on Opioid Treatment in Maine - September, 2003

Technical Review Reports:

Phase I - Assessment of State Management and Oversight of Opioid Treatment (PDF 71 kb)

Phase II - Assessment of the Opioid Treatment Provider System (PDF 73 kb)


The Maine State Office of Substance Abuse (OSA) has received the final report, conducted by a team of national experts, regarding OSA’s oversight of the methadone treatment system. The review, conducted during the the 2003 summer at OSA’s request, contains two parts: Phase I – Assessment of State Management of Oversight of Opioid Treatment, and Phase II – Assessment of the Opioid Treatment Provider System. The request for the independent review was made by OSA in response to the increase in overdose deaths in Maine over the past 2 years.

The report on the state’s oversight of the system focused most of its attention on the increase in overdose deaths and the state’s response. The report states “While this has been an extremely challenging year for all of the individuals involved, a review of all of the actions taken suggests that the approach Maine took to addressing the problem could serve as a model for other states faced with similar situations.”

The report further states that while the four programs in Maine meet national standards, the state’s system is “limited both in capacity and depth of experience,” further suggesting that opioid treatment should be expanded to meet a growing demand, particularly in rural areas of the state. The report also recommends more training of staff in the use of medication in substance abuse treatment as the use of methadone is relatively new to Maine and the field is not as well versed in appropriate treatment of opiate dependence as in other states where it has been available longer.

Documents listed on this page are in PDF format. The free Adobe Acrobat Reader is necessary to view them. Printouts of these documents are also available upon request.