Does Methadone Affect Your Memory?

There have been relatively few studies published that investigate the impact of methadone maintenance treatment on memory – and those that have appeared have reached conflicting conclusions.

Most recently, Curran and colleagues (London, UK) wrote in Psychopharmacologia (vol. 154, March 2001) that “A single dose of methadone can induce episodic memory impairment in patients who have a history of heroin use averaging more than 10 years.” However, they go on to note that “Such impairment can be avoided by giving methadone in divided dosage.”

On the other hand, two studies almost a quarter-century ago from different academic centers found that memory among methadone patients was NOT impaired. (Kelley et al, Int. Journal of the Addictions, vol. 13, Oct. 1978; and Grevert and colleagues, Archives of General Psychiatry, vol. 34, Jul. 1977).

Certainly, every patient’s complaints should be reviewed and responded to on an individual basis. However, based on the above, a very general approach might be to consider other sources of memory loss where it exists (especially, the possibility of consequences of long-term heroin use and the problems associated with it), but it’s also reasonable to consider early on a splitting of the methadone dose.