NCT00460239

Buprenorphine's Dose Response Curve

Evaluation of Opioid Antagonist Activity in Humans

• Status: Completed
• Phase: Phase 2
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 12 (actual)
• Sponsor: Johns Hopkins University · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 21 Years – 55 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Not accepted

Summary

This is a residential study that looks at the effects of buprenorphine in persons who abuse but are not dependent on opioids. Animal studies show that very high doses of buprenorphine produce less effects than mid-range doses. This suggests that buprenorphine can be a very safe medication. However, no studies in humans have tested higher doses in a similar way. The goal of this study is to show the effects of single doses of buprenorphine, across a range of doses, in persons who are not physically dependent on opioids (but do abuse opioids).

Detailed description

Preclinical studies have demonstrated for a variety of measures that buprenorphine has a bell-shaped dose response curve. However, human studies with buprenorphine have not shown such an effect, although controlled studies have generally not tested higher acute doses of buprenorphine. Current clinical recommendations generally place an upper limit of daily buprenorphine dosing at 32 mg of sublingual tablets, although considerably higher acute doses have been administered to humans (primarily in clinical studies of less than daily dosing). Determining the relationship between higher doses of buprenorphine in humans and effects produced would be valuable; it would be scientifically interesting to demonstrate a bell-shaped curve in humans, and it would help guide clinical practice (for example, with respect to dosing, safety, and side effect considerations. The purpose of this study is to characterize the dose response curve for buprenorphine in humans, utilizing acute single doses of parenteral buprenorphine.

Conditions

• Opioid-related Disorders

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
DRUG	Buprenorphine	Intramuscular, doses (8, 16, 32, 48, 60 mg) are blind; administered up to 1-2 times per week.
DRUG	Morphine	Intramuscular; up to 1-2 times per week; doses (15, 30 mg) double blind
DRUG	Placebo	Intramuscular; double blind; once per week

Timeline

• Start date: 2007-01-01
• Primary completion: 2009-07-01
• Completion: 2009-07-01
• First posted: 2007-04-13
• Last updated: 2017-03-03
• Results posted: 2017-03-03

Locations

1 site across 1 country: United States