AHS Views

I realized something today - people don’t understand addiction well enough to know when someone they know is addicted to drugs or alcohol. Here’s an interesting article about recognizing drug addiction that might shed some light on it. The article defines drug addiction as “the compulsive and continued use of a drug, or the loss of control over its use, despite adverse consequences produced by the drug.” So, when you see that, you know it’s time to get the person some addiction help.

Usually, the person will tell you that their drug use is under their control. That they can stop anytime they want.  You can tell them that it’s upsetting you a lot and it makes you unhappy. Under those circumstances, if the person is a family member, spouse, or someone with whom you have some interdependency - in other words, someone who considers they have some responsbility for your happiness - then they will stop.

If they don’t stop, they’re addicted. Really, it’s as simple as that. And it doesn’t matter if the problem is with street drugs, alcohol, or even prescription drug addiction - if they see it’s having negative consequences and they don’t stop, it’s because they can’t.

You need to talk to them about getting some kind of drug addiction help - a drug detox, drug rehab, whatever. If they refuse, if they insist they don’t have a problem, get some help. Call an interventionist. Addiction Help Services offers intervention services and can also help find a good drug detox, drug rehab and any other help you need.

According to a report by Blue Cross Blue Shield of Tennessee, the states with the highest percentage of its citizens addicted to prescription drugs are Tennessee and West Virginia. West Virginia just took over the number one spot, and drug rehab centers will probably be inundated with people needing addiction help. 

We’ve talked about “West Virginia and OxyContin” in this blog in the past, as well as “Tennessee and OxyContin.” You could also talk about “Florida and OxyContin.” in fact, you could pretty much relate OxyContin to any state in the country.

You can also say “Kids and OxyContin.”

One young lady named Jenninfer, from yet another state, Ohio, landed in drug detox at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in January 2007. Neither Jennifer’s parents nor teachers knew she needed any addiction help. Jennifer’s parents were lucky; Jennifer came forward and told them she was addicted to OxyContin.

Jennifer’s not the only kid in trouble in Ohio - 50 other children also received drug detox in Children’s Hospital in 2007. “Ohio and OxyContin.”

Fifty kids from Columbus going through drug detox should be an eye opener for parents. Keep your prescription drugs out of the reach of your kids. And get them the addiction help services they need if they’ve already discovered them.

In a Miami Herald article about a psychologist being investigated for drug abuse, Eulinda Jackson, a spokesperson for the Department of Health said “everything about this case is confidential”, including the psychologist’s name and whether or not he’s still practicing. Dr. Sidney Wolfe of the Washington-based consumer group Public Citizen commented that ‘doctors like to protect doctors,” and Raymond Pomm, head of the group that handles the impaired physicians’ program said ”If we don’t protect them, they won’t come knocking on the door.” A fine state of affairs - the medical professionals we depend on to take care of our health not only have drug problems themselves, their level of ethics is so low that if there’s a chance anyone will find out they have a problem, they won’t even get the addiction help services they need. What about their responsbility to their patients?

I realize that we’re not talking about all doctors by a long shot and I also realize that doctors are human like everyone else and have the same problems as anyone has who is driven to drugs or alcohol. But, they also hold a position of public trust that should not be violated or compromised. How can a doctor who’s stoned possibly guarantee that he will do no harm to his patients?

There are plenty of options out there for doctors.  A private, confidential Florida drug detox centers would be their first step.

The drug problem the psychologist written about in the article had is now being addressed - but only because his ex-wife saw drugs and drug paraphernalia at his house and wrote a letter to the authorities about it. If you know a doctor with a drug or alcohol problem, do them a favor and do the same thing. Write that letter. He will not only get the drug addiction help he needs, you could save his career, his life, and the lives of some of his patients.

Shouldn’t the NFL be getting football players who are addicted to OxyContin or painkillers the addiction help they need?

Brett Favre, who recently retired from professional football, had to deal with an addiction to Vicodin - and he managed to do it. The NFL estimates 10% of its players are addicted to painkillers. The reality of that estimate could be in question: I would guess it’s much higher - maybe as high as 15% or even 20%.  But the NFL doesn’t seem to care. If they did you’d be reading a lot more about celebrity football players receiving addiction help.

If you can’t play without them, prescription painkillers and prescription stimulants are performance enhancing, just like steroids.  I like to watch football but it is violent and the hits look very painful.  Prescription drugs are a formidable opponent in the battle against drug addiction: they are painful to withdraw from and unless you are supervised closely in a medical drug detox, you can be sick for days.

When their players don’t get the addiction help they need, the message from the NFL to high school and college kids is clear: play through pain, just use painkillers. It shouldn’t be like this for any sport. The message should be play without drugs, or don’t play at all.

Pro sports sending the message that drugs and sports don’t mix would take drug education up a notch - kids would understand that playing with the help of pills is no longer approved. It would also level the field - injuries or not. Addiction help is available for any athlete whether someone needs a drug detox or more intense addiction help services.

Thanks for your comments on the recent blogs on methadone. One thing I want to clarify is that it is not our intention to suggest that someone who’s been through drug rehab 17 times, has had migraines most of their life, or has degenerative physical problems or injuries that make it impossible to live a normal life should not take methadone. That’s not the point. Those are extreme circumstances and, as such, they call for extreme measures.

We’re concerned about the people who don’t have extreme situations and still wind up on methadone, or other potentially dangerous drugs and with the irresponsible prescribing of methadone and keeping people parked on it for years without ever really putting in the effort to get them through a drug rehab, without ever attempting to get them properly detox’d so they can get through withdrawal safely and without excruciating pain, without ever attempting to get their bodies back to, or maybe for the first time, functioning properly, without ever attempting to get to the bottom of why they started taking drugs in the first place and helping them resolve those issues.

This is a labor of love. We don’t see people on drugs as contemptible – although people who keep others on drugs unnecessarily or lead them to think that they can’t do otherwise are a different story. But we do see that, at times, drugs are necessary.

I would really appreciate the names of those 17 drug treatment or other programs that people have been to that did not work for them. We help people find addiction help services that have a comparatively good success rate and are suited to their situation. We would really like to know which ones you went to so we can be sure not to recommend them to others.

I would also appreciate knowing more about why you started taking drugs in the first place. Thanks again for responding.

Denmark is going to try prescription heroin for their worse heroin addicts. This is not a new idea: other countries have tried it, or are considering it. Denmark is going to try methadone as well. I am wondering where the drugs will come from. Is there a pharmaceutical company poised to get into the heroin trade? Will there be generic drug companies in the U.S. and elsewhere getting involved as well? Did the poppy growers in Afghanistan see this coming, is that why heroin production is at or near an all time high? Do the heroin farmers know they will have a place for their crops with Big Pharma, or will the local dealers be selling it to the Danish government at a big profit? What ever happened to getting an addict the addiction help he needs so he can actually get off drugs?

Trying to get someone off drugs is the right choice here at Addiction Help Services. Denmark knows they have 500 addicts that are really having a difficult time. Is sending them to a drug detox and addiction treatment out of the question?

Last year the number of major league baseball players testing positive for ADD was 28. This year it’s 103. Why the big change? According to Dr. Gary Wadler, chairman of the committee that determines banned substances for the World Anti-Doping Agency, it could be a ploy to get a “Therapeutic Use Exemption” for taking performance-enhancing stimulants. It could also forecast addiction and an increased need for addiction help for baseball players.

In 2006, amphetamines were banned. What does that have to do with ADD? The most commonly prescribed drugs for ADD are Ritalin and Adderall – both of which are compared to cocaine by the U.S. government. They are definitely stimulants, but they are not considered to be performance enhancing.

That alone is absurd  - how could anyone in baseball think that Ritalin and Adderall are not performance enhancing?

And they’re dangerous. Just like cocaine and many other street drugs. Both, if taken long enough, will minimally require drug detox to get off and 10 or 20 of  these players will end up needing addiction help and have to go into treatment.

And what about prescription painkillers: are they less harmful if taken for a long period of time? Not on your life. But it’s probably not a big deal if it means you can sign a $5 million contract. Stimulants and painkillers would be performance enhancing if you can’t play without them.

Steroids may be a problem in sports, but prescription drugs are an even bigger problem. And the epidemic is apparently is alive and flourishing in professional baseball. Get the addiction help services you need if you are having a problem with prescription drugs.

Montgomery County Superior Court sentenced Henry Martin Kolep to 10 years in prison for dealing in prescription drugs. His customers could have been buying Ritalin, Adderall, methadone, OxyContin, Percocet, Morphine, Xanax, Valium or any other prescription drug – all of which are Schedule II substances according to the DEA and, of course, very dangerous. They often cause dependency and addiction, and drug detox, drug rehab and other addiction help is frequently required to get off them.

Henry had never been arrested for drug dealing although he had a criminal history. Its unclear where Mr. Kolep received his drugs but it could have been the Internet, a doctor, a healthcare worker, or he may have stolen it – although theft is not usually a good source for a long time supply.

The drug manufacturers should be keeping better track of their sales so that substance abuse is not so easy and addiction help not so necessary. Many people may need pain medication for their pain, but when huge amounts are available on the streets or over the internet, supply chain issues need to be looked at.

It seems unlikely that the manufacturers aren’t getting paid for the drugs that are available on the street.

Prescription drug addiction, abuse, and dependency have surpassed street drug use in the U.S. The new drug dealers will find a supply of pills to sell instead of pounds of cocaine or bags of heroin.

Tens of millions of people need addiction help, and a large percentage of those are addicted to prescription pain killers, stimulants and tranquilizers. They need help to withdraw from those drugs and get the addiction help services they need.

Are some people genetically-disposed to addiction? In a recent review of medical literature, scientists isolated about 400 genes and chromosomes that may indicate that to be the case. But genes or no genes, it’s still going to be up to the individual to get the addiction help they need.

One of the major problems with the ‘gene’ theory is that it basically takes the control out of the hands of the individual. There’s not much a person can do about their genes, but they can do something about alcohol or drug addiction with the right treatment.

There are a lot of genetic predispositions to a lot of things - cancer, for example, is more likely to occur in people whose parents, grandparents, etc., had cancer. But does that mean they’re going to get it? Absolutely not. Neither does having ‘addiction genes’ mean that someone is going to get addicted.

The known facts are this: drug detox and drug rehab can help someone overcome addiction. And if they’re done right, your chances are pretty good. In fact, if you choose the right addiction help services - get into the right detox and rehab program for you -  and you really do the program thoroughly, you can beat it. Genes or no genes.

Meth and meth addiction is Oregon’s number one crime problem according to candidate John Kroger. John Kroger is running for Attorney General for the State of Oregon and if elected he will help get more people into drug treatment. “Évery year meth costs us hundreds of millions of dollars in prison and law enforcement costs, health care expenditures, and lost workforce productivity.” He wants to see people get the addiction help they need.

Mr. Kroger understands that treatment can save tax payers plenty of money, “for every dollar we invest in treatment, we will save nearly six dollars by bringing down the crime and incarceration rates.”

His plan to send more people to drug treatment makes more sense then sending people to prison. Currently Oregon ranks 45th in the nation for addiction help overall and 49th for treatment in young adults ages 18 to 25. He will need to find a successful treatment program to help the meth users in Oregon, and he will need more treatment centers.

The number of small meth labs in Oregon has decreased since 2005 when the Governor put laws in place to limit the supplies that methamphetamine manufacturers needed to produce this deadly drug. But like other parts of the country, large drug trading organizations filled that hole by importing drugs from Mexico. Mr. Kroger wants to take on the drug cartel head on. We hope he is successful, we see the devastation meth and other drugs bring to society everyday.

If his plan works, Mr. Kroger will cut the supply and force more people into treatment instead of sentencing the addicts to long stints of incarceration which, in the long run, doesn’t usually result in them getting the addiction help they need. Instead, they often wind up back on drugs, and back in prison.

Addiction Help Services can help you, a family member or friend if you are having trouble with meth or any drug if you live in Oregon.