Feature Channels: Alcohol and Alcoholism

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New research out of the University of Cincinnati suggests boys are more likely than girls to abuse over-the-counter drugs.

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Male military veterans with a history of heavy alcohol use are more likely to seek treatment and, later, report better overall health and less depression than their civilian counterparts, according to new research released today at the American Public Health Association’s 140th Annual Meeting in San Francisco, Calif.

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Mother rats respond much differently to cocaine than female rats that have never given birth, according to new research that looks at both behavior and brain chemistry. The findings may help lay the groundwork for more tailored human addiction treatment.

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Researchers from Stony Brook University have developed a high-resolution, 3D optical Doppler imaging tomography technique that captures the effects of cocaine restricting the blood supply in vessels of the brain.

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Chronic morphine exposure has the opposite effect on the brain compared to cocaine in mice, providing new insight into the basis of opiate addiction, according to Mount Sinai School of Medicine researchers.

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A study by a team of University of Kentucky researchers has shed new light on the potential habit-forming properties of the popular pain medication tramadol, in research funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse. The paper is slated to appear in an upcoming edition of the academic journal Psychopharmacology.

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Since moderate drinking is common for more than a third of the population, the findings suggest the effect of increased alcohol consumption, even in moderate amounts, on atrial fibrillation risk in patients with pre-existing cardiovascular disease may be considerable.

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New study finds African-American youths are over-exposed to alcohol advertising.

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One in four mothers believe that letting young children taste alcohol may discourage them from drinking in adolescence and 40 percent believe that not allowing children to taste alcohol will only make it more appealing, according to a new study by RTI International and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

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Association between drug, alcohol problems and mortality most prominent in younger veterans with PTSD, including those from Iraq, Afghanistan

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A new study shows that people who have three or more alcoholic drinks per day may be at higher risk for experiencing a stroke almost a decade and a half earlier in life than those who do not drink heavily. The research is published in the September 11, 2012, print issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

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Less than half of community-based substance abuse treatment programs in the United States currently make HIV testing available on-site or through referral. A new study led by researchers at Weill Cornell Medical College shows the cost-effectiveness of integrating on-site rapid HIV testing into drug treatment programs.

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A new study published in a special issue of Substance Abuse finds that recovering alcoholics who help others in 12-step programs furthers their time sober, consideration for others, step-work, and long-term meeting attendance.

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The new imaging study in a mouse model for fetal alcohol spectrum disorders could enhance the diagnoses of birth defects caused by alcohol exposure in the womb and it illustrates how the precise timing of that exposure could determine specific kinds of defects.

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Almost 30 years after discovery of a link between alcohol consumption and certain forms of cancer, scientists are reporting the first evidence from research on people explaining how the popular beverage may be carcinogenic. The results, which have special implications for hundreds of millions of people of Asian descent, were reported here today at the 244th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society.

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New research indicates that urban American Indian youth who follow American Indian traditional spiritual beliefs are less likely to use drugs and alcohol.

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Why do some colleges have persistently high levels of binge drinking? It may be because, at these schools, binge drinking is associated with high status and binge drinkers are happier with their college social experience than their non-binge drinking peers, suggests new research.

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New research examining relationships and the use of alcohol finds that while a long-term marriage appears to curb men’s drinking, it’s associated with a slightly higher level of alcohol use among women.

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In a major breakthrough, an international team of scientists has proven that addiction to morphine and heroin can be blocked, while at the same time increasing pain relief.

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New report shows significant differences in demographics and abuse patterns of substance abuse treatment admissions in rural versus urban communities.

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A new report shows that 37.2 percent of substance abuse treatment admissions involve both alcohol and drug abuse. According to a report by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), 23.1 percent of all admissions reported the abuse of alcohol and one other drug, and 14.1 percent reported the abuse of alcohol and two or more drugs.

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The content of alcohol ads placed in magazines is more likely to be in violation of industry guidelines if the ad appears in a magazine with sizable youth readership, according to a new study from the Center on Alcohol Marketing and Youth (CAMY) at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

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Heavy drinking is known to affect an adolescents’ developing brain, but certain patterns of brain activity may also help predict which teens are at risk of becoming problem drinkers, according to a study by researchers in the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and VA San Diego Healthcare System.

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Results of a new study offer compelling evidence for the first time that mephedrone, like cocaine, does have potential for abuse and addiction.

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A large international study led by University of Adelaide researchers has found that women who use marijuana can more than double the risk of giving birth to a baby prematurely.

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U of S researchers have discovered the chemical pathway that Cannabis sativa uses to create bioactive compounds, paving the way for the development of marijuana varieties to produce pharmaceuticals or cannabinoid-free industrial hemp.

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A change in the formula of the frequently abused prescription painkiller OxyContin has many abusers switching to a drug that is potentially more dangerous, according to researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. The formula change makes inhaling or injecting the opioid drug more difficult, so many users are switching to heroin.

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Experts have thought that multiracial adolescents, the fastest growing youth group in the United States, use drugs and engage in violence more than their single-race peers. But in a new study, researchers find that mixed-race adolescents are more similar to their white counterparts than previously believed.

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The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) today released two reports regarding substance abuse. The first indicates that youths between the ages of 12 and 17 are far more likely to start using most substances during the summer than during other parts of the year. The second report of data from the Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN) system shows that the rate of increase in drug-related emergency department (ED) visits slowed from an average annual rate of 18.2 percent in the years between 2005 and 2008, to an average annual rate of 6.1 percent in the years 2009 and 2010.

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Drug traffickers who want to leave the “game” behind often struggle to do so because they fear loss of power and status, a new study shows. Those who do leave the illegal drug trade often do so because of a complex mixture of issues including fatherhood, drug use and abuse, and threat of punishment by authorities or fear of retaliation. Researchers concluded that traffickers need ways that allow them to leave the drug business without surrendering their entire identity.

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For patients with substance use disorders (SUD), a continuing care approach like that used for other chronic diseases reduces long-term health care costs, reports a study in the June issue of Medical Care. The journal is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, a part of Wolters Kluwer Health.

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Addiction to food may be replaced by an addiction to alcohol according to JAMA research and a Loyola bariatric surgeon shares why this is important.

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Among patients who underwent bariatric surgery, there was a higher prevalence of alcohol use disorders in the second year after surgery, and specifically after Roux-en-Y gastric bypass, compared with the years immediately before and following surgery, according to a study in the June 20 issue of JAMA.

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State laws that limit driving privileges for teens have reduced the incidence of drinking and driving among the nation’s youngest licensees, according to a new study from researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. Graduated driving licensing laws limit the number of passengers young drivers may transport and how late at night they’re allowed to drive, among other restrictions.

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Research into alcohol’s effect on juvenile rats shows they have an ability to build up a physical, but not cognitive, tolerance over the short term — a finding that could have implications for adolescent humans, according to Baylor University psychologists.

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When it comes to cocaine, users of the drug in Lubbock abuse up to a third more on the weekends.

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Rather than gaining “liquid courage” to let loose with friends, teenage drinkers are more likely to feel like social outcasts, according to a new sociological study.

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Patients ages 13 to 24 given opioids for pain more than twice as likely to become addicted if they have mental health disorder, study finds.

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Study in rats suggests transgenerational effects.

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High school juniors and seniors sometimes get more than a campus tour on college visits, suggests a new national survey by the Center for Adolescent Research and Education (CARE) at Susquehanna University and SADD (Students Against Destructive Decisions).

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The U.S. had the second-lowest proportion of students who used tobacco and alcohol compared to their counterparts in 36 European countries, a new report indicates.

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The term “holiday heart syndrome” was coined in a 1978 study to describe patients with atrial fibrillation who experienced a common and potentially dangerous form of heart palpitation after excessive drinking, which can be common during the winter holiday season. The symptoms usually went away when the revelers stopped drinking. Now, research from UCSF builds on that finding, establishing a stronger causal link between alcohol consumption and serious palpitations in patients with atrial fibrillation, the most common form of arrhythmia.

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The use of 12-step programs, such as Alcoholics Anonymous, by adolescents with a history of drug and alcohol abuse not only reduces the risk of relapse but also leads to lower health care costs, according to research by the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health.

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A Perspective piece published online today in the New England Journal of Medicine outlines a plan for an “ideal” prescription-drug monitoring program that would enable doctors, dentists, pharmacists, researchers and law enforcement officials to access real-time data on patients’ prescription drug histories to help cut abuse of these drugs.

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Researchers have found evidence that early drug and alcohol use is associated with lower levels of educational achievement. They found that people who began drinking or using drugs as young teens or who became substance dependent were less likely to finish college

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Ron Mize, assistant professor of Latino Studies at Cornell University, and co-author of “Consuming Mexican Labor and Latino Immigrants in the United States,” comments on this week’s events in Monterrey, Mexico that claimed 49 lives in the country’s ongoing drug war.

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Alcohol is far too attractive and easy to obtain for youth on the Internet, according to a commentary from the Center on Alcohol Marketing and Youth (CAMY) at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Published in Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, the commentary accompanies a new report from authors Rebecca Williams and Kurt Ribisl at the University of North Carolina that documents the relative ease with which underage youth can purchase alcohol online.

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Surveys of U.S. adolescents suggest that the estimated peak risk of using prescription pain relievers for extramedical use, such as to get high or for other unapproved indications, occurs in mid-adolescence, according to a report published Online First by Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, a JAMA Network publication.

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The smoking cessation drug varenicline significantly reduced alcohol consumption in a group of heavy-drinking smokers, in a study carried out by researchers at the Ernest Gallo Clinic and Research Center at the University of California, San Francisco.

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New report examines the extent to which states’ alcohol advertising laws incorporate eight different best practices to reduce youth exposure to alcohol advertising and marketing.