Feature Channels: Addiction

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TELCOR, the leading vendor truly focused on point of care testing (POCT) middleware innovations, has introduced the first interface that seamlessly updates operator demographic information and competency completion information directly from a facility’s LMS/HRIS to its POCT middleware solution. CAP/CMS/JCAHO inspections become more productive and efficient because operator and competency record updates along with the count of tests performed by each operator are combined into one system. Automatically completing competency requirements allows seamless continuity of patient care when sending operator updates to POCT devices for those who completed their competency requirements and oversight of those who have not.

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SelectScience® is offering laboratory scientists the chance to enjoy an adventure of a lifetime. Simply leave a product review today to be entered into a competition to win flights to a destination of your choice*.

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Inability to manage negative emotional and somatic stress is associated with opioid misuse in adults with chronic pain, according to new research reported in The Journal of Pain, published by the American Pain Society,

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A new study shows the potential for patients who have both addiction issues and chronic pain to be helped by an approach that combines behavioral therapy and social support to help them manage their pain without medications that themselves pose an addiction risk.

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New study of patients who survive Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS) finds their subsequent quality of life has more to do with lifestyle factors than how sick they were in the hospital.

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New research sheds light on what’s going on inside our heads as we decide whether to take a risk or play it safe. Scientists located a region of the brain involved in decisions made under conditions of uncertainty, and identified some of the cells involved in the decision-making process. The work could lead to treatments for psychological and psychiatric disorders that involve misjudging risk, such as problem gambling and anxiety disorders.

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CompuGroup Medical US (CGM), developer of CGM LABDAQ®, has announced it will unveil its latest laboratory information system solution, CGM LABDAQ™ TELEIOS, at AACC’s Annual Scientific Meeting & Clinical Lab Expo in Philadelphia. CGM LABDAQ TELEIOS throughout the week at its AACC booth #3719.

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COLUMBUS, Ohio – Raising the national minimum age to buy cigarettes to 21 would save lives by preventing adolescents from ever taking up smoking, a new report suggests. The minimum age to buy tobacco products in most of the country is 18. In their analysis, Ohio State University public health experts detail how raising the minimum tobacco sales age would be effective in improving health and note the economic consequences to retailers would be minimal.

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BrandTech® Scientific featuring BRAND Liquid Handling Products at AACC 2016

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Fio Corporation is exhibiting its cloud-based connectivity and reporting platform for decentralized health care at the 68th American Association for Clinical Chemistry (AACC) Annual Scientific Meeting & Clinical Lab Expo from July 31st to August 4th.

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Many times experimental data was not reproducible even though all variables within the experimental procedure stood up to scrutiny. But was this really the case?

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The introduction of this new screw cap container represents the latest significant innovation within the Eppendorf Tubes® 5.0 mL system.

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Eppendorf’s new refrigerated Centrifuge 5920 R combines extraordinary high capacity with enhanced temperature management in a very compact and ergonomic product design.

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Festo features at AACC 2016, July 31- Aug. 4 in Philadelphia, the company’s automation solutions for clinical diagnostic equipment. Festo automation lowers manufacturer engineering costs and boosts diagnostic speed and overall performance. (Festo AACC Booth #3939)

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Medical Electronic Systems (www.mes-global.com) is a Los Angeles based technology company specializing in rapid, automated semen analysis for the human and the veterinary markets. The MES line of CE and FDA cleared Sperm Quality Analyzers, complementary testing kits and disposable testing supplies are sold through an extensive network of international distributors. MES is ISO certified as a medical manufacturer and has wholly owned distribution offices in America, Europe, China and Israel.

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The Clinical Laboratory Automation Module (CLAM-2000) is a fully integrated sample pretreatment module for LC-MS. The system automatically performs all of the processes necessary for analyzing blood and other biological samples, from scanning in information from the blood collection tubes to sample pretreatment and LCMS analysis.

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Advanced Instruments, Inc., a leader in laboratory instrumentation, announced today that it has received 510(k) clearance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to market its GloCyte Automated Cell Counter System and GloCyte Low and High Level Controls.

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During National Chiropractic Health Month (NCHM) in October, the American Chiropractic Association (ACA) will build on its ongoing efforts to raise awareness of the value of a conservative approach to pain management in the face of the U.S. opioid epidemic with the theme and hashtag #Chiropractic1st.

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Children whose caregivers misuse alcohol or use, produce or distribute drugs face an increased risk of medical and behavioral problems. According to a new clinical report by experts at Beth Israel Medical Center (BIDMC) and Boston Children’s Hospital, pediatricians hold the unique position to assess risk and intervene to protect children. The report is available online today and will appear in the August print edition of Pediatrics, the journal of the American Association of Pediatrics.

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Most people would get a little ‘rush’ out of the idea that they’re about to win some money. In fact, if you could look into their brain at that very moment, you’d see activity in the part of the brain that responds to rewards. But for marijuana users, that rush just isn’t as big – and gets smaller over time, a new study finds. And that may open them up to more risk of addiction.

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BUFFALO, N.Y. — Panel's recommendations are not warranted until long-term studies on representative samples of smokers show this is good for public health overall, Lynn T. Kozlowski writes in new journal paper.

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Costs of patients who develop chronic post-surgical pain could range from $2.5 million to $4.1 million a year, in one Ontario hospital alone, according to a study in Pain Management.

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A UAB psychologist discusses addiction and recognizing the symptoms of mental illness in adults and children.

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Current public perceptions about alcohol- and other drug-use disorders are out of step with scientific knowledge. There remains a general belief that these disorders are essentially moral failings and/or bad choices. This view is completely at odds with research demonstrating that these disorders are indeed a brain disease. A documentary called “The Anonymous People” features personal narratives that call for a fundamental reframing of the national conversation about alcohol and substance-use disorders and recovery.

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Girls who were overweight as children are likely to begin using cigarettes, marijuana or alcohol at an earlier age than their healthy-weight peers, according to a new study by researchers in the Indiana University School of Education.

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The immune system in the elderly is dysfunctional and infections are more prevalent, more severe, and harder to defeat. Drinking alcohol has a variety of damaging effects on the immune system and organs – like the gut, liver and lung – which can be worsened by pre-existing conditions as well as consumption of prescription and over-the-counter medications that aged individuals often take. This presentation addresses how alcohol affects the elderly more dramatically, and also suppresses their ability to battle infections, like pneumonia, much more severely than it does younger individuals.

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While many people view college drinking as the norm, less understood is that how students drink can place them at a higher risk for multiple problems. Drinking on an empty stomach usually means that someone will get drunk faster, given that food helps to absorb alcohol, slowing down alcohol absorption into the bloodstream. A growing trend among college drinkers is called “drunkorexia,” a non-medical term that refers to a combination of alcohol with diet-related behaviors such as food restriction, excessive exercising, or bingeing and purging.

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As Rutgers University's substance abuse helpline enters its second year, it counts its success one call at a time

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Alcohol treatment has come a long way from enforced isolation in asylums, and technological advancements are particularly promising in terms of their capacity to improve treatment effectiveness. Promising research looks at the feasibility, implementation, validity and utilization of mobile momentary-assessment breathalyzers within the context of an intensive outpatient (IOP) treatment for alcohol-use disorders (AUDs).

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It’s no secret that social environments can play a role in the development as well as recovery from substance-abuse problems. A new study, designed to uncover how individual relationships respond to substance use and social influences, has found that the links between substance use and social connections are bidirectional and strong.

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Health-promotion and disease-prevention efforts can no longer use a one-size-fits-all approach. Efforts targeting emerging adult populations – encompassing late adolescence and early adulthood – must embrace and utilize multi-pronged, multi-media approaches in order to be successful. This presentation discusses a unique media-awareness campaign designed to reduce binge drinking, as well as associated HIV/HCV risk, among Hispanic/Latino emerging adults.

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Underage drinking is a major public health and social problem in the U.S. The ability to identify at-risk children before they initiate heavy alcohol use has immense clinical and public health implications. A new study has found that demographic factors, cognitive functioning, and brain features during the early-adolescence ages of 12 to 14 years can predict which youth eventually initiate alcohol use during later adolescence around the age of 18.

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The minimum legal drinking age (MLDA) in the U.S. regulates the age at which individuals can legally purchase and possess alcohol in public. An MLDA of 21 has been linked to a number of benefits, including a lower risk for alcoholism in adulthood. However, no studies have examined linkages between exposure to MLDAs during young adulthood and mortality later in life. This study examined if young adults – college and non-college students – exposed to a permissive MLDA (younger than 21) had a higher risk of death from alcohol-related chronic diseases compared to those exposed to an MLDA of 21.

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Gender and a family history of alcoholism (FH) are two genetically determined factors known to affect someone’s risk for developing alcohol-use disorders (AUDs). Adolescence is also a critical period for the development of AUDs; drinking habits can be unstable and environmental factors such as peer pressure may be substantial. This study looked at how gender and FH might affect alcohol use in a sample of 18- to 19-year-olds from the Dresden Longitudinal Study on Alcohol use in Young Adults (D-LAYA).

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A new study describes the differences in self-reporting of nonmedical opioid use among high school seniors. The results underscore that medical and law enforcement communities may be underestimating opioid use and not just among younger populations.

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Free radicals can reach the endoplasmic reticulum, a cellular organelle that is critical in manufacturing and transporting fats, steroids, hormones and various proteins, and alter its function by oxidizing and damaging its most abundant and crucial to protein folding chaperone, Protein Disulfide Isomerase (PDI).

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Nearly 2 million people in the United States are addicted to prescription opioids, and millions more feel the pain, including their families, friends and clinicians. How did we get here? “When we look back in 20 years I want us to say, ‘This is when the country woke up, when we as clinicians decided to step up in our role as leaders, as advocates, to create a foundation for better health.

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The 39th annual Research Society on Alcoholism Scientific Meeting will take place June 25-29 in New Orleans, Louisiana. RSA 2016 provides a meeting place for scientists and clinicians from across the country, and around the world, to interact. The meeting also gives members and non-members the chance to present their latest findings in alcohol research through abstract and symposia submissions.

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Cannabis use during pregnancy is associated with abnormal brain structure in children, according to a new study in Biological Psychiatry.

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Suicide is among the top ten causes of death in the U.S. One in four people worldwide suffer from some type of mental illness. Two-thirds of them do not get the treatment they need. We are faced with mass shootings, a rise in heroin addiction, young people lured into terrorist groups, veterans suffering with PTSD, and increases in depression and anxiety among children and adults. These are stark illustrations that mental illness is a major international problem.

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Nearly 15 percent of opioid-naïve patients hospitalized under Medicare are discharged with a new prescription for opioids, according to a study published today in JAMA Internal Medicine.  Among those patients who received a prescription, 40 percent were still taking opioids 90 days after discharge. The rate of prescription varied almost twofold between hospitals, with some hospitals discharging as many as 20 percent of patients with a prescription for opioids.

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Kennesaw State University's Center for Young Adult Addiction and Recovery responds to a rising number of students seeking help for eating disorders and the increased use of drugs and alcohol by local youth.

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This story looks at the use of opioids to recover from surgeries, while examining patient expectations and current practices. This story also covers an initiative entitled "Opioids for Pain: Be Smart. Be Safe. Be Sure."

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Rats that responded to cues for sugar with the speed and excitement of binge-eaters were less motivated for the treat when certain neurons were suppressed, researchers discovered.

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On May 31st, the World Health Organization hopes to spur the nearly one billion smokers worldwide to put down their cigarettes for World No Tobacco Day. While this annual event generates media attention and is a potential starting point for many quit attempts, without a sustained effort these smokers will likely be puffing away again in a matter of weeks. Researchers say that one way to keep the momentum going after this once-a-year push to get smokers’ attention, is to use every Monday as a weekly opportunity to support smokers in their efforts to quit and stay quit.

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When nerve cells have to communicate with each other in our brains, it involves release of small signal molecules, the so-called neurotransmitters, which act as chemical messengers in specific points of contact between nerve cells, called synapses. Here the released neurotransmitter is bound and registered by receptors at the surface of the receiving nerve cell. This will, in turn, trigger a signal which is sent on to other nerve cells.

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s those cues can become desirable in and of themselves, as shown in a new study published in Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience by researchers from Concordia University in Montreal.