Replacement therapy upon prescription

Starting from November 20, 2017, opioid dependency patients from the Kievski district of Odessa will be able to receive the replacement therapy prescription and medications.

The first replacement therapy receipt office in Ukraine has been opened in Odessa, on the base of the city tuberculosis hospital №3.

The opening of the office was made in the frames of the pilot project “Sustainability of the HIV services”, which is being implemented by the common efforts of the Odessa city council and Odessa Charity Foundation “Way Home” under the support of the USAID project “HIV Reform in Action”.
«Today’s opening of the receipt doctor office for the replacement therapy medications has become the significant event showing the serious intentions of the city administration towards the shift risk groups from the opioid drugs to the replacement therapy medications. We all hope it to be the first step on the way towards the healing of these people from the drug dependency, decreasing the spreading of the HIV-infection among the risk groups and the improvement of the criminal situation in the area”, – Natalia Kitsenko, the head of the pilot project mentioned during the opening ceremony.

Now the patients, after providing the necessary documents and completing the tests, will be able to receive the receipts for the RT medications, that then can be received in the “Interkhim” pharmacies of the city. «We are proposing the co-financing model of payments for the medications for our patients: part of the cost is being paid by the patient, and part of the cost is covered by the government, — said Iliya Podolyan, the narcologist. “ Co-financing is one of the mechanisms of the stability of the replacement therapy for the patients. Most of the patients are ready to make this step and replace drugs with the safer and completely legal medicine. And apart from that, Replacement Therapy is the first step towards the healing from the drug dependency for these people».
Iliya Podolyan states that right now 98 people are already receiving the replacement therapy by the receipt. The number of patients is soon will be moving towards 200 people.