The Legal Regulation of Medication Treatment for Opioid Use Disorder — Teaching Points for Residents

[...]physicians were permitted to prescribe opioids for medical conditions such as pain but not for OUD. Federal law (42 CFR §8.12) does allow for OTPs to provide patients receiving maintenance treatment with take-home doses of methadone, and there is a time-in-treatment requirement associated with these take-home doses (i.e., the longer a patient is in treatment, the more take-home doses he/she is eligible to receive from the OTP) [4]. §1306.07(b) is often referred to as the “three-day rule.” In this scenario, the physician is not required to have an X-waiver and the hospital does not have to be a licensed OTP. §1306.07(d) is the law that authorizes physicians approved by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) to be granted an X-waiver from the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) to prescribe buprenorphine for treatment of OUD.