Epidemiological Study of Mortality from Methadone Abuse in Cadavers Referred to Iranian Legal Medicine Organization

Despite the increase in the death rate due to methadone abuse, this drug is still used in most drug rehabilitation center as a maintenance drug to treatment drug addiction. This study is the epidemiological investigation of deaths caused by methadone abuse, so that by analyzing and planning needed the death rate and costs caused will be reduced.

 This research is a descriptive-analytical cross-sectional study on 5,901 deaths caused by methadone use in 2020 and 2021, which were referred to the Legal Medicine Organization. The demographic and epidemiological information of these people was collected using a checklist and analyzed with SPSS version 19 software.

The results show that deaths caused by abuse of methadone increased 8.7 percent in 2021 compared to the previous year. On the other hand, the highest mortality rate is related to middle-aged men, unmarried, with low education and no stable job, in the provinces of Kermanshah, Lorestan and Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad.

Increasing the awareness of patients treated with methadone maintenance, especially the high-risk groups, about the high probability of death if this drug is used more than the allowed amount or taken simultaneously with other compounds is too important.