Feature Channels: Addiction

• share
• favorite_border

Individuals with alcohol dependence (AD) often have sleep-related disorders such as insomnia, circadian-rhythm sleep disorders, breathing-related sleep disorders, movement disorders, and parasomnias such as sleep-related eating disorder, sleepwalking, nightmares, sleep paralysis, and REM sleep behavior disorder. The last comprehensive review on this topic was published in March 2005. This review examines the various aspects of insomnia associated with AD, especially using findings over the last decade, and employing updated diagnostic criteria for sleep disorders found in the third edition of the International Classification of Sleep Disorders.

• share
• favorite_border

Doctors and public health officials differ on the potential long-term effects of vaping and the use of e-cigarettes as smoking cessation tools. But they agree the devices shouldn't explode in your face.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

UCLA experts are available for interviews about opioid-related topics

• share
• favorite_border

A scientific blueprint to end tobacco cravings may be on the way after researchers crystallized a protein that holds answers to how nicotine addiction occurs in the brain.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health found that, from 2002 to 2014, there was an increase in the probability of having a prescription opioid use disorder among young adults using prescription opioids for non medical purposes.

• share
• favorite_border

One in 6 women in the U.S. takes antidepressants to improve her well-being, but what is she to do when the medication that is meant to help disrupts another area of her life?

• share
• favorite_border

In an important discovery in the battle against the United States’ growing drug epidemic, a Michigan State University economist has found the Carolinas could be a hotspot for the trafficking and production of the drug Ecstasy.

• share
• favorite_border

A new national study shows for the first time how smoking bans in cities, states and counties led young people living in those areas to give up, or never take up, the use of cigarettes.

• share
• favorite_border

Highly caffeinated energy drinks (EDs) have been of concern to the public-health community for almost a decade. Many young people consume EDs with alcohol to decrease alcohol’s sedative effects and stay awake longer, enabling them to drink more alcohol. Adding to the growing body of research linking ED consumption with risk-taking and alcohol-related problems, this study examined its relationship with drunk driving. Importantly, the researchers differentiated between the different ways in which EDs are consumed: exclusively with alcohol, exclusively without alcohol, or both with and without alcohol depending on the occasion.

• share
• favorite_border

While the association between alcohol and homicide may seem obvious, there has been no recent study of alcohol involvement in homicide victimization in U.S. states. This study drills down into the subject, looking at how often alcohol was involved in homicide victimization, and what socio-demographic and other factors may be predictors.

• share
• favorite_border

The DC Center for Rational Prescribing (DCRx) today announced the availability of two new online education courses aimed at teaching doctors and other healthcare professionals some of the myths and facts surrounding the use of prescription opioid painkillers. The information in the online videos could help curb the epidemic of opioid-related deaths by reducing unnecessary prescriptions—and offers valuable advice on how to wean patients from these addictive drugs.

• share
• favorite_border

UCLA Health experts are available to discuss a wide variety of topics of interest for the month of October.

• share
• favorite_border

Rutgers surveys find high rates of heroin use, panhandling and homelessness

• share
• favorite_border

Heavy drinking can lead to neurophysiological and cognitive changes ranging from disrupted sleep to more serious neurotoxic effects. Aging can also contribute to cognitive decline. Several studies on the interaction of current heavy drinking and aging have had varied results. This study sought to elucidate the relations among age, heavy drinking, and neurocognitive function.

• share
• favorite_border

Trauma exposure has consistently been reported as a risk factor for alcohol use and related problems. Further, racial differences in alcohol use, alcohol use disorder (AUD), and trauma exposure between European American (EA) and African American (AA) women have been reported previously. This study sought to identify racial differences in alcohol involvement, and to examine the risk conferred by specific trauma exposures and PTSD for different stages of alcohol involvement in EA and AA women.

• share
• favorite_border

The holistic approach to patient care and pain management used by Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetists (CRNAs) can help prevent opioid dependency, substance use disorder, drug overdoses and death, according to the American Association of Nurse Anesthetists (AANA).

• share
• favorite_border

A UAB-crowdfunded study to provide naloxone kits to family and friends of at-risk opioid users has distributed more than 100 kits and has seen nine overdose reversals since it began in November 2015.

• share
• favorite_border

Everyone knows that tobacco products are bad for your health. However, according to research at Texas A&M, it turns out the nicotine itself—when given independently from tobacco—could help protect the brain as it ages, and even ward off Parkinson’s or Alzheimer’s disease.

• share
• favorite_border

New research shows that self-reported quit rates among hospital patients more than doubled when nurses and other staff were trained to coach patients on how to stop smoking and to make sure they got the help they needed to make it happen, whether that meant counseling, patches, gum or prescription medication.

• share
• favorite_border

Jonathan Samet, M.D., M.S. of the University of Southern California Keck School of Medicine, will tackle the issue of tobacco and health, explaining how solid research can drive gains in public health.

• share
• favorite_border

Novel Psychoactive Substances are synthetic or “designer” drugs which have increased in popularity in recent years. Few studies in the U.S. have focused on use among one of the highest-risk populations—electronic dance music (EDM) nightclub and festival attendees. Researchers from NYU and Kings College found that more frequent nightclub attendance was strongly associated with increased risk of use of new street drugs. Attending nightclubs every week more than doubled the odds of reporting use.

• share
• favorite_border

By employing the same tactics it used to drive policymaking from the 1970s-1990s, the tobacco industry has become successful in influencing pro-industry e-cigarette laws at the state level, according to a UCSF study published in the September issue of Milbank Quarterly.

• share
• favorite_border

Cells in the lung are constantly exposed to oxygen and intermittently exposed to other environmental factors, resulting in a susceptibility to oxidative injury. Both alcohol use disorders (AUDs) and cigarette smoking heighten pulmonary oxidative stress, likely due to antioxidant depletion. Pulmonary oxidative stress damages innate immunity, which can contribute to increased pneumonia susceptibility and severity. This study sought to understand whether measures of pulmonary oxidative stress in upper airway fluid are comparable to measures in the lower airways, and whether either compartment is preferentially affected by AUDs and/or smoking. If upper airways’ and lower airways’ oxidative stress indices are similar, less invasive methods to assess pulmonary oxidative stress, such as mini-bronchoalveolar lavage (mini-BAL) or sputum evaluations, could be used in research and clinical settings.

• share
• favorite_border

A research team from the University of Louisville has received a Centers of Biomedical Research Excellence grant of more than $11.5 million over five years from the National Institutes of Health to explore diseases of the liver—hepatobiology and toxicology.

• share
• favorite_border

Prescription opioid overdose, abuse, and dependence carries high costs for American society, with an estimated total economic burden of $78.5 billion, according to a study in the October issue of Medical Care. The journal is published by Wolters Kluwer.

• share
• favorite_border

An updated Cochrane Review published today provides an independent, rigorous assessment of the best available evidence to date about electronic cigarettes for quitting smoking.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers investigated how beliefs influence subjective craving and neural activities in nicotine-addicted individuals, discovering that belief about the presence of nicotine affects craving and brain activity, providing insights into the complex nature of belief–drug interactions.

• share
• favorite_border

Suicide was the tenth leading cause of death in the United States in 2013. There is clear evidence that intoxication and chronic, heavy drinking are often associated with suicide. While alcohol policies are known to be effective in reducing excessive drinking, this review undertakes a critical look at the literature on the relationship between alcohol policies and suicide.

• share
• favorite_border

The Developmental Exposure Alcohol Research Center (DEARC) at Binghamton University is joining the cause to increase awareness of the risks of drinking alcohol while pregnant.

• share
• favorite_border

College student marijuana use continues its nearly decade-long increase, according to the most recent national Monitoring the Future study.

• share
• favorite_border

Users of both electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS) and cigarettes may be more intent on quitting tobacco, but that intention seems to drop off among less educated smokers, according to a study by Georgia State University researchers published in the journal Addictive Behaviors.

• share
• favorite_border

New research from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai using electroencephalography, or EEG, indicates that adults addicted to cocaine may be increasingly vulnerable to relapse from day two to one month of abstinence and most vulnerable between one and six months. The findings, published online today in JAMA Psychiatry, suggest that the most intense periods of craving for illicit substances often coincide with patients’ release from addiction treatment programs and facilities.

• share
• favorite_border

There may be a way to switch off the urge for compulsive drinking, according to a new study in animal models led by scientists at The Scripps Research Institute.

• share
• favorite_border

Heavy drinking frequently causes liver inflammation and injury, and fatty acids (FAs) involved in pro- and anti-inflammatory responses could play a critical role in these processes. This study evaluated heavy drinking and changes in levels of omega-6 (ω-6, pro-inflammatory) and omega-3 (ω-3, anti-inflammatory) FAs in alcohol dependent (AD) patients who showed no clinical signs of liver injury.

• share
• favorite_border

Most Internet gamblers in NJ are men, but more high rollers are women, study finds

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine have identified 34 neural factors that predict adolescent alcohol consumption. The list, based upon complex algorithms analyzing data from neuropsychological testing and neuroimaging studies, was significantly more accurate —approximately 74 percent — than demographic information alone.

• share
• favorite_border

If you really want a drink right now, the source of your craving may be a pea-sized structure deep inside the right side of your brain, according to scientists at the Indiana University School of Medicine.

• share
• favorite_border

Since the isolation of morphine from opium in the 19th century, scientists have hoped to find a potent opioid analgesic that isn’t addictive and doesn’t cause respiratory arrest with increased doses.

• share
• favorite_border

Banning tobacco sales within 1,000 feet of schools could reduce socioeconomic and racial/ethnic disparities in tobacco density across neighborhoods, according to a study being published today in the journal Nicotine & Tobacco Research.

• share
• favorite_border

If you ask two different doctors about e-cigarettes, you might get two different answers.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers know that youth with a family history of alcoholism have a greater risk of developing an alcohol use disorder; this heightened vulnerability may be due to impulsive behavior. For this study, researchers examined “waiting” impulsivity – a tendency toward prematurely responding to a reward, and previously associated with a predisposition to drinking. The study sample comprised young, moderate-to-heavy social drinkers who were either positive (FHP) or negative (FHN) for a family history of alcoholism. Impulsivity was assessed after an alcoholic or non-alcoholic drink.

• share
• favorite_border

UCLA experts are available for interviews about marijuana-related topics

• share
• favorite_border

New research from the University of British Columbia suggests there may be some truth to the belief that marijuana use causes laziness-- at least in rats.

• share
• favorite_border

Drug addicts and non-addicts may have more in common than ever thought, according to a researcher at Texas A&M University who found that to some degree, everyone’s brain is “wired” to become addicted.

• share
• favorite_border

Expert can speak on the promise of vaccines to counter heroin addiction and broader efforts to address opioid addiction. Roger Crystal, M.D., CEO of Opiant Pharmaceuticals, has an interest in this area inspired by his company’s own efforts to develop opioid antagonist nasal sprays and other innovative formulations for the treatment of substance abuse disorders, addictive disorders and eating disorders.

• share
• favorite_border

A new study aims to better understand what makes some individuals particularly vulnerable to developing drug addiction. A team of researchers from across the country will look at how genes that influence brain function cause risk for addictions. J. David Jentsch, Empire Innovation Professor of psychology at Binghamton University, is part of the team of investigators awarded a new grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to conduct the research.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers have identified a brain mechanism that could be a drug target to help prevent tolerance and addiction to opioid pain medication, such as morphine, according to a study by Georgia State University and Emory University.

• share
• favorite_border

Being homeless puts people at greater risk of HIV infection than those with stable housing, but targeting services to reduce risk behaviors is often complicated by fuzzy definitions of homelessness.

• share
• favorite_border

An international team led by scientists at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) has found strong evidence supporting a new strategy against drug addiction.