How Complicated Is it to Switch to Opiate Short Term then Back to Low Dose Naltrexone (LDN)?

How Complicated Is it to Switch to Opiate Short Term then Back to Low Dose Naltrexone (LDN)?

How complicated is it to switch to opiate short term then back to LDN for surgery, for severe injury flares, et cetera?

Oh, great question. If someone knows that they have a surgery that's coming up, so let's say you have a repair that's going to be done and it's scheduled, and let's say it's going to be scheduled for this Saturday, you literally would stop your LDN about three days before. And if you're not using opiates after the fact, then you can literally go right back to your usual dose.

If you are off LDN for an extended period of time, because you're using opiates for pain control after surgery, you may be able to restart your previous dose without any complications.

What we have seen is that some people, if they're off LDN for two weeks, they literally need to start at a much lower dose and then work up and they don't necessarily always get to where they were before they had surgery.

Sometimes that happens even with flares. So we've seen situations where they don't necessarily have surgery, but the pain is so intense that they have to use opiates. And if they're using opiates for longer than a couple of weeks, they may need to restart at the very bottom of the LDN dosing chart and then work back up.