Methadone Swimmers from Germany, Please Help!

[IkBenDeMan]

I will be moving to Berlin, Germany, sometime in 2009, (the sooner the better), and I need to find a methadone clinic and I've heard there's quite a few in Berlin, I've been having trouble finding any information on the internet. I haven't been able to find a listing of clinics in Berlin and I would like to be able to contact the clinic ahead of time and make sure everything is set up... because I doubt my clinic would give me anymore than a week worth of take homes when I'm leaving the country... and getting there and not being able to get into a clinic would be devestating... Please help.

[Dickon]

It may or may not be true that....

I was prescribed methadone in Berlin for a couple of years about 12 years ago. I cant remember the details of how it was arranged, but I know that I had to pick it up daily from the doctors. I think Germany is a fairly civilized place, and getting a script is not particularly different. I know I took a little over a fortnights worth from England, and had it sorted before that run out.

One VERY IMPORTANT thing is that when I was in Berlin methadone was 5 times stronger than in England, and there's no reason to assume it's changed since then. I was on a poxy 30mg script in England, but was given 30ml of German liquid which contained 150mg of methadone. This made me quite ill, but a 5-1 ratio I imagine could occasionally be fatal. So please check the strength of any liquid they give you. It may save your life, or maybe I just had a very negligent doctor.

Oh yes, one other really important thing is to get your health insurance sorted out. It's a card based system, and I was using heroin in Berlin before I had a script in either Germany (where I was working) or England (my home country). I just don't know what to advise about this, it took AGES for me to get this card. Germans are very beaurocratic, but once I had my Krankenkasser (health insurance) Card access to medical services was very easy. I spent a vast ammount of time in Berlin doctor shopping.