www.ambiente.us FEBRUARY / FEBRERO 2008
Snake Oil for Meth Addiction - Only 15k
By Jim Pickett
The controversial and unproven treatment protocol for alcohol,
cocaine and methamphetamine addiction – called Prometa
and being heavily marketed by the Hythiam company – is
something you should have on your radar, hons. Since gay
men are disproportionately dealing with crystal meth problems
– we are in Hythiam’s unscrupulous sites.
Don’t be a sucker. We all need to be good consumers of substance abuse treatment, and need to be
wary of swamp land, snake oil, and anything that comes across as magical or miraculous. If it’s too
good to be true, it probably is. Would you respond to that email from the wealthy Nigerian widow who wants
to give you a percentage of her $15 million inheritance in exchange for a little help with international
banking?
So what’s the skinny on Prometa?
Recently, MSNBC reported Prometa, the drug "cocktail" designed to combat addiction to cocaine and
methamphetamine, got another nail in the cross when authorities Pierce County, Washington froze the
funding for an $800,000 pilot program, citing “irregularities� in testing after a damaging audit.
Read more recent press.
Basically this drug protocol, using three already FDA approved drugs off-label, has yet to be proven safe and
effective. That’s a big deal. It means that data from randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled
studies have yet to be published, though there is such a trial currently underway at UCLA now and we might
see some results in the next quarter.
Sure, Hythiam has touted a number of studies, that don’t meet the above criteria, but as we know, when
you don’t have a placebo control or randomization (where neither the patients nor the investigators know
who is taking the active agent and who is essentially getting a sugar pill), we can’t really know whether
the drug treatment being tested actually works or not.
The treatment, which costs $15,000 for crystal and cocaine treatment, and a few grand less for alcohol
treatment, involves intravenous infusions of Flumazinil, a reversal agent for benzodiazepines like Valium
and Klonopin. The second drug, hydroxyzine, is an antihistamine, and the third, sold as Neurontin, as an
anti-seizure medication frequently used "off prescription" as a treatment for a number of ailments, including
alcoholism and hearing loss.
Hythiam doesn’t need FDA approval for their scheme, because it is only selling a “protocol� and
is not the maker, nor the seller of these drugs. So, no approval needed, and Hythiam, by clearly putting
profits before proof, doesn’t seem to care a rat’s patoot about science, though they do pretend.
Buyer beware – the Prometa study recently concluded in Dallas (and conducted by a Prometa practioner)
showed some diminishment of “cravings’ for crystal, trumpeted far and wide, especially to the
financial community. But look closely and you will see that the majority of folks in the study continued to use
crystal! Cravings be damned.
Would you spend $15,000 for an appetite suppressant that doesn’t diminish your hunger?
We all deserve substance abuse treatment that has met the rigorous demands of science and has been
proven to work.
Prometa is not the first, and won’t be the last, shady marketing scheme to prey on vulnerable people,
like gay men and their friends and lovers in the throes of a tina meltdown. It behooves us all to be smart,
savvy and critical.
By the way, if a placebo-controlled, randomized, double-blind clinical trial proves that Prometa is effective at
treatind crystal meth addiction, I will be in the front of the line doing high kicks and twirling my tassles. But
not before.
Jim Pickett runs the LifeLube blog and is co-chair of Chicago’s LGBT Task Force on Substance Use
and Abuse (formerly the Chicago Crystal Meth Task Force.)
Copyright © LifeLube.org & AMBIENTE MAGAZINE. Do not reproduce without citing this source.
Snake Oil for Meth Addiction - Only 15k
By Jim Pickett
The controversial and unproven treatment protocol for alcohol,
cocaine and methamphetamine addiction – called Prometa
and being heavily marketed by the Hythiam company – is
something you should have on your radar, hons. Since gay
men are disproportionately dealing with crystal meth problems
– we are in Hythiam’s unscrupulous sites.
Don’t be a sucker. We all need to be good consumers of substance abuse treatment, and need to be
wary of swamp land, snake oil, and anything that comes across as magical or miraculous. If it’s too
good to be true, it probably is. Would you respond to that email from the wealthy Nigerian widow who wants
to give you a percentage of her $15 million inheritance in exchange for a little help with international
banking?
So what’s the skinny on Prometa?
Recently, MSNBC reported Prometa, the drug "cocktail" designed to combat addiction to cocaine and
methamphetamine, got another nail in the cross when authorities Pierce County, Washington froze the
funding for an $800,000 pilot program, citing “irregularities� in testing after a damaging audit.
Read more recent press.
Basically this drug protocol, using three already FDA approved drugs off-label, has yet to be proven safe and
effective. That’s a big deal. It means that data from randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled
studies have yet to be published, though there is such a trial currently underway at UCLA now and we might
see some results in the next quarter.
Sure, Hythiam has touted a number of studies, that don’t meet the above criteria, but as we know, when
you don’t have a placebo control or randomization (where neither the patients nor the investigators know
who is taking the active agent and who is essentially getting a sugar pill), we can’t really know whether
the drug treatment being tested actually works or not.
The treatment, which costs $15,000 for crystal and cocaine treatment, and a few grand less for alcohol
treatment, involves intravenous infusions of Flumazinil, a reversal agent for benzodiazepines like Valium
and Klonopin. The second drug, hydroxyzine, is an antihistamine, and the third, sold as Neurontin, as an
anti-seizure medication frequently used "off prescription" as a treatment for a number of ailments, including
alcoholism and hearing loss.
Hythiam doesn’t need FDA approval for their scheme, because it is only selling a “protocol� and
is not the maker, nor the seller of these drugs. So, no approval needed, and Hythiam, by clearly putting
profits before proof, doesn’t seem to care a rat’s patoot about science, though they do pretend.
Buyer beware – the Prometa study recently concluded in Dallas (and conducted by a Prometa practioner)
showed some diminishment of “cravings’ for crystal, trumpeted far and wide, especially to the
financial community. But look closely and you will see that the majority of folks in the study continued to use
crystal! Cravings be damned.
Would you spend $15,000 for an appetite suppressant that doesn’t diminish your hunger?
We all deserve substance abuse treatment that has met the rigorous demands of science and has been
proven to work.
Prometa is not the first, and won’t be the last, shady marketing scheme to prey on vulnerable people,
like gay men and their friends and lovers in the throes of a tina meltdown. It behooves us all to be smart,
savvy and critical.
By the way, if a placebo-controlled, randomized, double-blind clinical trial proves that Prometa is effective at
treatind crystal meth addiction, I will be in the front of the line doing high kicks and twirling my tassles. But
not before.
Jim Pickett runs the LifeLube blog and is co-chair of Chicago’s LGBT Task Force on Substance Use
and Abuse (formerly the Chicago Crystal Meth Task Force.)
Copyright © LifeLube.org & AMBIENTE MAGAZINE. Do not reproduce without citing this source.
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