Doctor Explores the Price of His Addiction in ‘Free Refills’
What happens when you combine extreme stress with easy access to drugs that seem to make that stress go away?
Tag Archives: prescription drug abuse
Do Young-Adult Prescription Opioid Abusers Understand Their Risks?
In the U.S., significant numbers of young adults are involved in the abuse a prescription opioid medication. An increase in this form of drug abuse largely helps explain the current increase in the frequency of opioid overdoses. In a study published in July 2014 in the International Journal of Drug Policy, a team of American […]
Narcan Training Saves Lives, Offers Addicts Hope for Recovery
After New Jersey’s law protecting first responders who administer the opioid overdose antidote Narcan was signed into law in March, a free training program is helping ordinary citizens learn to administer the drug and save lives, as well as shining a spotlight on the issue of addiction.
17 Percent of College Students Abuse ADHD Drugs
New findings from a group of American researchers indicate that almost one-fifth of all U.S. college students misuse a prescription medication classified as a stimulant.
Tapering Buprenorphine Less Effective Than Maintenance Treatment for Opioid Addiction
Ongoing buprenorphine maintenance therapy is superior to buprenorphine detoxification in treating prescription drug addiction, researches from the Yale University School of Medicine Yale have found.
Many Teens Don’t Get Enough Rest, But Sleeping Pills Are Risky Solution
About 15 million adolescents do not get enough sleep, various sleep studies have found, and researchers believe that biology is at least partly to blame because of the evidence that teen brains are programmed to fall asleep later and also to wake later.
Which Drug Use Cues Play a Role in Prescription Opioid Dependence?
Researchers and addiction specialists are well aware that people affected by physical dependence and drug addiction commonly have a susceptibility to certain social and environmental cues that make ongoing substance use and relapses during substance treatment more likely. However, fairly little is known about the specific drug cues that motivate people physically dependent on prescription […]
Sober Dorms, Recovery Clubs Help Prevent Relapse
College students face a number of pressures, from paying for tuition to the stresses of academic success and failure. Among the many modern challenges that young academics face is addiction. Drinking on college campuses is common, risky and dangerous. There are also students using prescription drugs to get by as they experience depression or anxiety […]
Anxiety: Not Always a Bad Thing
People who suffer from anxiety sometimes feel as if they are cats in a room full of rocking chairs. We worry about our jobs, our appearance, weight, families and social lives. We want to be as happy and comfortable as our grandparents, yet our grandparents did not face the type and scope of worries that […]
Most Teens who Abuse Prescription Medicines Get them for Free
The 2012 “Monitoring the Future” study, which looks at the rates of drug use, ease of availability, and perceived risk amongst teens, revealed that the vast majority of teens who abuse prescription medicines get them for free from friends and family. Although the overall use of the drugs has decreased, their use is still at […]
Teens Taking ADHD Medications to Improve Academics
Using stimulants to get ahead is not a new idea. Drugs that give you energy, even just caffeine have been used and abused for decades by people who need more energy, who need to stay awake, and who need to focus to get something done. However, we may be facing a new epidemic among young […]
Overprescription of Xanax
Xanax is a common commercial form of alprazolam, a sedative medication that belongs to a class of drugs called benzodiazepines. Like other drugs in this class, it achieves its calming effects by altering the way your body uses a naturally occurring chemical known as GABA (gamma aminobutyric acid). Xanax is the most frequently prescribed mental […]
Elements Behavioral Health Reminds Parents to Lock the Cabinet During National Prevention Week
In honor of SAMHSA’s first annual National Prevention Week, Elements Behavioral Health is reminding parents to do their part in preventing teen prescription drug abuse.
Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN) Findings Released
Findings from the 2009 Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN) have been released and show that there were nearly 4.6 million drug-related emergency department (ED) visits in 2009. About half (49.8 percent, or 2.3 million) of the 4.6 million were due to adverse reactions to pharmaceuticals. Almost one half (45.1 percent, or 2.1 million) of the […]
Academic-Enhancing Drugs Like Adderall Are Impacting Students Nationwide
A recent article in the Washington Post illustrates how the seemingly harmless practice of sharing unused meds is becoming a national epidemic. In the article, one anonymous coed describes her routine of selling leftover pills from her Adderall script to friends she believes are only using it as a study aid.
Are We Over-Medicating for Mental Health Problems?
In a country where we can buy over-the-counter pain relievers which portend to address highly specialized discomforts such as headache, joint ache, backache, migraine and mild arthritis could we be over-medicating for mental discomforts? Some are wondering if we have become a population that is ready to pop a pill the moment we feel even […]
Makers of OxyContin Concealed Its Addictive Nature
We now know that OxyContin is a dangerous, highly addictive painkiller that has turned normal, law-abiding Americans into “hillbilly” heroin addicts and criminals. We also know that executives at Purdue Pharma, the company that manufactures OxyContin, covered up the data that would have predicted such a result.