Painkillers | Addiction Treatment Strategies

In general, the chance of addiction is very small when narcotics are used under proper medical supervision.

NOTE: THIS WEEK I ATTENDED A PRESENTATION ON AN OPIATE ANTI-CRAVING MED HERE IN THE MIDWEST. TOWARD THE END OF THE TALK WAS A BRIEF PRESENTATION OF SIDE EFFECTS. MOST OF THE STANDARD SIDE EFFECTS WERE THERE. TOWARD THE END OF THE LIST WAS THE FOLLOWING WORD… “TOOTH ACHE”. IT…

Chronic pain affects 116 million Americans and costs the U.S. as much as $635 billion each year, according to a new report from the Institute of Medicine (IOM) that called for changes in how chronic pain is managed.
Much of the chronic pain experienced by Americans isn’t treated …

No child aspires to a lifetime of addiction. But their brains might. In new research to appear online in the journal Neuropsychopharmacology this week, Rockefeller University researchers reveal that adolescent brains exposed to the painkiller Oxycontin can sustain lifelong and permanent…

New Data Shows Average Age of First Use Dropping;
White House Drug Policy Director Warns of Consequences of Rising Teen Marijuana Use
Washington, DC—Gil Kerlikowske, Director of National Drug Policy (ONDCP), today alerted parents to the heightened dangers of marijuana use that has risen…

Nichole Marie Case unwittingly became dependent on opioid pain drugs. She’s not alone.
The National Institute on Drug Abuse estimated in 2008 that 1.85 million people in the United States were dependent on or abusing prescription opioids, also known as Schedule II painkillers.
Americans…

 
An examination of unintentional overdose deaths in West Virginia, a state that has experienced one of the highest increases in the rate of drug overdose deaths, finds that the majority of these were associated with the nonmedical use and diversion of pharmaceuticals, primarily pain…

Unintentional overdose deaths in teens and adults have reached epidemic proportions in the U.S. In some 20 states in 2007 the number of unintentional drug poisoning deaths exceeded either motor vehicle crashes or suicides, two of the leading causes of injury death. Prescription opioid pain…

Now, the rate of prescription drug abuse is outpacing abuse of cocaine, heroin, hallucinogens and meth combined, analysis shows.

ScienceDaily  — Few primary care physicians pay adequate attention to patients taking prescription opioid drugs — despite the potential for abuse, addiction and overdose, according to a new study by researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University.
The…