How Do the Hospitals Detox the Drug Infants?

Question by Emma Brown: How do the hospitals detox the drug infants?
I am watching police women of Dallas county and there is an episode where one of the police officers confronts a woman who is pregnant and is a heroine user. She says she had a daughter a few years ago who was addicted to Methodone as an infant and had to stay in the hospital for a month. How does the hospital staff detox these infants?

Best answer:

Answer by David
They give the infants methadone or buprenorphine (subutex/suboxone) and taper them off that slowly.
This is for addiction with opiates. For alcohol (in the unlikely event that the infant survived as alcohol a much more toxic drug than Heroin) or benzodiazepines they would use a low dose of diazepam/chlordiazepoxide and taper accordingly.

Stimulants (meth, cocaine, speed) aren’t physically addictive/dependence forming like the CNS depressant drugs, so there is no need to taper the infants off.

Cases of newborns with addictions soaring
Some 1,300 babies in Massachusetts — about three to four each day — were born in 2012 with what is called “neonatal abstinence syndrome,” suffering withdrawal pains as a result of exposure to illegal opiates such as heroin or prescription drugs such …
Read more on Boston Globe

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