Feature Channels: Addiction

• share
• favorite_border

Most older Americans drink alcohol. Given that this segment of the population is projected to almost double by 2050, reaching 112 million, in the future, there will likely be many more older drinkers in the United States than currently. Importantly, older individuals are more sensitive to alcohol’s effects than their younger counterparts, and are also more likely to take prescription medications that can interact negatively with alcohol, potentially leading to falls and other injuries. This study examined trends in drinking status among U.S. adults 60 years of age and older.

• share
• favorite_border

Despite greater awareness of the dangers of prenatal exposure to alcohol, the rates of Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders remain alarmingly high. This study evaluated academic achievement among children known to be prenatally exposed to maternal heavy alcohol consumption as compared to their peers without such exposure, and explored the brain regions that may underlie academic performance.

• share
• favorite_border

Heroin use is associated with excessive histone acetylation, an epigenetic process that regulates gene expression, and more years of drug use correlate with higher levels of hyperacetylation, according to research conducted at The Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and published in the journal Biological Psychiatry.

• share
• favorite_border

Although college can be demanding for young adults, it may be particularly so for transgender students struggling with identity-formation and other emotional, social, and developmental challenges. Prior research suggests that transgender students may experience greater drinking and negative alcohol-related consequences than their cisgender peers (i.e., those whose gender matches their sex at birth). This study examined levels of drinking, frequency of blackouts and other alcohol-related consequences, and drinking motivations among transgender college students.

• share
• favorite_border

Opioids, including heroin and prescription drugs, killed 33,000-plus people in 2015, more than any year on record, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. President Trump’s proposed budget aims to bring a $500 million increase in funding for prevention and treatment, but that amount isn’t enough to address the crisis, says an expert on substance use disorder treatment at Washington University in St.

• share
• favorite_border

Dawn Andersen lost her husband to lung cancer, and as a longtime smoker herself, she also was at high risk for the disease. So Loyola Medicine pulmonologist Sean Forsythe, MD, recommended Mrs. Andersen undergo a CT lung cancer screening test, which has been shown to save lives among longtime smokers by detecting lung cancer in early stages when it’s most treatable.

• share
• favorite_border

States where Medicaid coverage was expanded under the Affordable Care Act have had a significant increase in prescribing of buprenorphine—a medication that plays an important role in addressing the opioid epidemic, reports a study in the April issue of Medical Care. The journal is published by Wolters Kluwer.

• share
• favorite_border

Veterans who have drug or alcohol problems are more than twice as likely to die by suicide as their comrades, a new study finds. And women veterans with substance use disorders have an even higher rate of suicide -- more than five times that of their peers, the research shows.

• share
• favorite_border

Online media briefing to announce first saliva test to measure steady-state opioid drug levels in doctors’ offices. Test verifies therapy compliance and helps prevent drug misuse and diversion.

• share
• favorite_border

A study by researchers at the University of Vermont has revealed a link between adult opioid misuse and childhood emotional abuse, a new finding that suggests a rethinking of treatment approaches for opioid abusers.

• share
• favorite_border

Major national studies provide little evidence that e-cigarette users move to smoking cigarettes as a result, researchers from UB, Michigan write.

• share
• favorite_border

A legal analysis published today examines the FDA’s regulatory authority to provide consumers with information via tobacco products and their labeling; how actively FDA could do that within existing First Amendment constraints; and new approaches to interpreting and applying the federal Tobacco Control Act and the First Amendment.

• share
• favorite_border

An emergency room visit for an illness or injury may seem like a strange time to try to motivate someone to cut back on using drugs. But a new study suggests that even a half-hour chat with a trained counselor, or a few minutes using a special tablet computer program with a “virtual therapist”, can turn an emergency room trip into the basis for a long-lasting drop in a person’s use of illegal drugs or misuse of prescription medicines.

• share
• favorite_border

Stress and anxiety are widely believed to contribute to drinking. Alcohol is thought to reduce tension caused by stress (the “flight or fight” response) as well as alleviate the unpleasant symptoms of anxiety (anticipation of the unpredictable, impending threats). Prior research, however, has yielded inconsistent findings as to the unique relations between stress and anxiety, on the one hand, and alcohol consumption and alcohol use disorders, on the other hand. This study was designed to examine how differences in self-reported levels of anxiety, anxiety sensitivity, and perceived stress impact the frequency and intensity of drinking, alcohol craving during early withdrawal, and alcohol craving and stress reactivity.

• share
• favorite_border

The U.S. medical community needs a better understanding of the biology of pain and how it plays out in individuals to be able to combat the national epidemic of addiction to painkillers.

• share
• favorite_border

Latinos experience significant disparities in health care including higher rates of particular cancers, lower cancer screening rates and cancer diagnoses at more advanced stages. Researchers at The University of Kansas Cancer Center want to help Latinos with tobacco cessation treatment (both medication and behavioral support) via text messaging.

• share
• favorite_border

Daily users of e-cigarettes see them as about as satisfying or even more satisfying, and less harmful, than cigarettes, according to the results of a small study from the University at Buffalo.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

The need to belong and experience social connections is a fundamental human characteristic. Prior research has shown that social rejection is linked to increases in negative emotions, distress, and hostility. This study examined the impact of social rejection on alcohol use, and whether the impact differed when the social rejection was by close others, such as friends, spouses or family members, or by strangers or acquaintances.

• share
• favorite_border

Addiction medicine expert Petros Levounis says a maintenance treatment that combines medication with behavioral treatment and recovery support gives patients the best chance of sustainable recovery

• share
• favorite_border

Dr. Chaudhry (FSMB President and CEO) sits down with Dr. Daniel Gifford, Immediate Past Chairman of the FSMB Board of Directors and Chair of the Workgroup on FSMB’s Model Policy on the Use of Opioid Analgesics in the Treatment of Chronic Pain. Drs. Chaudhry and Gifford discuss the work of FSMB's Workgroups as they prepare for the future of medical regulation and assisting state medical boards in their mission to protect the public.

• share
• favorite_border

People with intermittent explosive disorder (IED)—a condition marked by frequent physical or verbal outbursts—are at five times greater risk for abusing substances such as alcohol, tobacco and marijuana than those who don’t display frequent aggressive behavior, according to a new study by researchers from the University of Chicago.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

More than two in five people receiving buprenorphine, a drug commonly used to treat opioid addiction, are also given prescriptions for other opioid painkillers – and two-thirds are prescribed opioids after their treatment is complete, a new Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health study suggests.

• share
• favorite_border

Fathers who use cocaine at the time of conceiving a child may be putting their sons at risk of learning disabilities and memory loss. The findings of the animal study were published online in Molecular Psychiatry by a team of researchers from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.

• share
• favorite_border

UNC scientists found that as mice learn to associate a particular sound with a rewarding sugary drink, one set of prefrontal neurons becomes more active and promotes reward-seeking behavior while other prefrontal neurons are silenced, and those neurons act like a brake on reward-seeking.

• share
• favorite_border

Listen up ladies. Women simply don’t metabolize alcohol in the same way as men. It’s called the telescoping effect.

• share
• favorite_border

Underage youth are nearly twice as likely to recall seeing alcohol marketing on the internet than adults, with almost one in three saying they saw alcohol-related content in the previous month, according to a new pilot survey led by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

• share
• favorite_border

How easy do adolescents think it is to get heroin? A Saint Louis University researcher examines how their perceptions have changed from 2002 to 2014.

• share
• favorite_border

Problem gambling among credit counseling clients is the focus of a $34,500 seed grant awarded to the School of Social Work and Guidewell Financial Solutions.

• share
• favorite_border

UKanQuit, a joint inpatient program between the University of Kansas Medical Center and The University of Kansas Hospital, is helping more smokers quit the habit

• share
• favorite_border

The average news consumer might be surprised to learn that the economic costs of alcohol abuse far exceed those related to illegal drug use. In California, alcohol abuse cost $129 billion in 2010, $3,450 per California resident. That was almost three times the $44 billion bill for illicit drug use. The largest cost contributors were mortality, impaired driving, and violence. The costs varied greatly from city to city and county to county.

• share
• favorite_border

In this month’s release, find new embargoed research about: Affordable Care Act television news content; housing assistance’s link to resident health; and the effect of CVS ending tobacco sales on cigarette purchasing.

• share
• favorite_border

Rather than inciting fear, anti-smoking campaigns should tap into smokers’ memories and tug at their heartstrings, finds a new study by Michigan State University researchers.

• share
• favorite_border

At a glance: New research shows great variation among clinicians’ opioid prescribing practices and links physician prescription patterns to patients’ risk for subsequent long-term opioid use. Being treated by an emergency room physician who prescribes opioids more frequently increases a patient’s risk of long-term opioid use and other adverse outcomes. The results suggest that differences in clinicians’ prescribing habits may be helping to fuel the opioid epidemic sweeping the United States.

• share
• favorite_border

The first successful randomized trial of its kind provides preliminary evidence that telephone-based smoking cessation counseling given to smokers shortly after undergoing lung cancer screening can be effective at helping people stop smoking.

• share
• favorite_border

Nicotine -- the primary compound found within tobacco smoke -- is known to change the grouping of some subtypes of nicotine receptors, but the mechanisms for nicotine addiction remain unclear. This inspired a group of University of Kentucky researchers to explore the role nicotine plays in the assembly of nicotine receptors within the brain. During the Biophysical Society meeting, Feb. 11-15, 2017, Faruk Moonschi will present the group’s work, which centers on a fluorescence-based “single molecule” technique they developed.

• share
• favorite_border

The emergence of e-cigarettes as a nicotine product has left scientists with many questions about their impact on health, including how the product interacts with depression. A new study by researchers at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth), published today in Nicotine & Tobacco Research, found a connection between depression and initiation of e-cigarette use among college students.

• share
• favorite_border

FDA ad campaign geared toward rural teens who use smokeless tobacco products fails to provide public with important information on relative risks of smokeless tobacco compared to traditional cigarettes, Kozlowski and Sweanor write.

• share
• favorite_border

Among high school seniors who have never smoked a cigarette, those who vape are more than four times more likely to smoke a cigarette in the following year than their peers who do not vape.

• share
• favorite_border

Taking one oxycodone tablet together with even a modest amount of alcohol increases the risk of a potentially life-threatening side effect known as respiratory depression, which causes breathing to become extremely shallow or stop altogether, reports a study published in the Online First edition of Anesthesiology.

• share
• favorite_border

A study led by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health found high levels of toxic metals in the liquid that creates the aerosol that e-cigarette users inhale when they vape.

• share
• favorite_border

Hyperalgesia refers to an increased sensitivity to pain. It can occur during alcohol withdrawal, and may contribute to a relapse to drinking. Alternative therapies such as acupuncture and electroacupuncture (EA; which combines acupuncture with electrical stimulation) are effective in reducing pain and, possibly, alcohol-withdrawal symptoms. This rodent study investigated whether EA can alleviate hyperalgesia during alcohol withdrawal, potentially reducing the risk of a relapse to drinking, and whether it achieves this effect via action at mu opioid receptors (MORs) located in a brain region called the lateral habenula.

• share
• favorite_border

Yale researchers found in a study that one in four high schoolers who use electronic cigarettes are inhaling vapors produced by dripping e-liquids directly onto heating coils, instead of inhaling from the e-cigarette mouthpiece, possibly increasing exposure to toxins and nicotine.

• share
• favorite_border

A new Berkeley Lab-led study found that the sticky residue left behind by tobacco smoke led to changes in weight and blood cell count in mice. These latest findings add to a growing body of evidence that thirdhand smoke exposure may be harmful.

• share
• favorite_border

A number of animal studies and a small human pilot study have revealed that cannabinoids, extracts of cannabis legally sold as medical marijuana, could reduce cravings and ease withdrawal symptoms in heroin users.

• share
• favorite_border

Cocaine use has long been tied anecdotally to higher-than-usual rates of impulsive behavior, including risky sex, but the tie-in has been difficult to study with any scientifically controlled rigor.

• share
• favorite_border

Cytokines are small proteins in the immune system that act as chemical messengers between cells. Prior research suggests that pro- and anti-inflammatory cytokines are dysfunctional during alcohol dependence and may contribute to the progression from healthy to problem drinking. This study compared social and non-dependent problem drinkers on the impact of alcohol-related changes in the body’s immune response to stress, alcohol-cue induced craving and anxiety, motivation to drink, and alcohol consumption.

• share
• favorite_border

Scientists at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) have found that deep brain stimulation (DBS) can greatly reduce the compulsion to use heroin in standard rat models of addiction.

• share
• favorite_border

A new clinical guideline from the American College of Gastroenterology offers the first recommendations in over 10 years on the evaluation of abnormal liver chemistries. For the first time in a liver test guideline, the authors define a normal healthy serum alanine aminotransferase (ALT) level for women and men (up to 25 IU/L for women, up to 33 IU/L for men) and recommend that levels above this should be assessed by physicians.