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Tag: drug problems

Teens and drugs: Drug use statistics and treatment that works

Here are some drug use statistics: Over 80% of teens engage in some form of deviant behavior (1). Over 50% of high-school seniors admit to having used drugs (2). Only 10%-15% of the population develop drug addiction problems related to their drug use (1). The question is: If the majority of teens experiment with drug…

August 28, 2012
Small town heroin addicts – When drug use and overdose hit smalltown USA

We’ve already talked (see here) about the fact that well-off teens are in no way protected from the damages of drug abuse. We’ve even published a story by a reader who became addicted to heroin after another friend introduced her to snorting oxycontin pills. This recent article, published in the Washington Post, tells the story…

November 7, 2009
Addiction-brain effects: Sex addiction, neurotransmitters, and being love addicted

***A disclaimer: Sex addiction is a relatively new concept in science. I haven’t been able to find much research on the subject, so much of what is being said here is my interpretation of the current literature on sexual responsivity in humans.*** I’ve already mentioned that scientists are beginning to consider behavioral addictions (like gambling…

August 30, 2009
Take Charge of your Life: Another adolescent substance abuse prevention program that doesn’t work.

In a previous post we talked about the ineffectiveness of the school-based substance abuse prevention program called D.A.R.E. (Drug Abuse Resistance Education). We reported data from a meta-analysis of 11 studies which showed no significant effect of D.A.R.E. in reducing drug use. A recently published study examined the effectiveness of another school-based program called Take…

August 16, 2009
About addiction: Exercise, stigma, marijuana, and friendhip.

Here we are again. I’ve been slacking on this, but check out the new crop of great articles about addiction. As usual, if you press the title of this post, you’ll be rewarded with our relevant posts!!! MSNBC: Exercise may help prevent substance abuse – Here’s an article that reports on some of the findings…

August 2, 2009
Struggling with my addiction: Recovery, addiction, and the everyday stuff

I’ve written about my own struggles with my addiction on here numerous times. I’ve used crystal meth, ecstasy, cocaine, marijuana, alcohol, LSD, mushrooms, and more, though the first few were the ones that really got me. After an extended career as a dealer and addict, I turned a new leaf and made a new life…

July 9, 2009
Addiction brain effects : Opiate addiction – Heroin, oxycontin and more

Okay, we’ve talked about crystal meth and cocaine and how they affect the brain during drug use. As I mentioned, both cocaine and meth interfere with the way the brain stores and cleans up important neurotransmitters, including, most importantly, Dopamine and Norepinephrine. The class of drugs known as opiates, which includes morphine, heroin, codeine, and…

July 3, 2009
More CPDD Addiction research: Addiction, exercise, recovery!

Okay, this is probably the last addiction research update I will give focusing on the Reno conference. The rest of the stuff I learned will be incorporated into future posts. I’ve written before about the relationship between exercise and recovery (see here) and I will surely write more since for me, it was a big…

June 30, 2009
The brain addiction connection : Crystal meth, and our friend dopamine

We’ve talked about the general way in which neurons in the brain communicate with one another and then reviewed the ways in which cocaine messes some of the basic processes that the brain depends on. It’s time to move on to another drug, and since the brain-addiction connection is similar for meth and cocaine, it…

June 27, 2009