‘MATs Replace One Addiction with Another’ - NIDA Head Takes on Debate The New England Journal of Medicine A number of barriers contribute to low access to and utilization of medication-assisted therapies (MATs), including a paucity of trained prescribers and negative attitudes and misunderstandings about addiction medications held by the public, providers, and patients. For decades, a common concern has been that MATs merely replace one addiction with another. Many treatment-facility managers and staff favor an abstinence model, and provider skepticism may contribute to low adoption of MATs.
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Residential Treatment Programs Play Key Role in Preventing ODs Journal of Addiction Medicine (free ASAM member resource) This case is an excellent illustration of addressing the challenges of implementing overdose prevention education and distributing naloxone rescue kits within a residential treatment program. During and after residential treatment is a particularly vulnerable time for people with opioid dependence, because unless they are maintained with methadone or buprenorphine, their opioid tolerance is decreased. Therefore, if they relapse, they are much more vulnerable to overdose death...
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Video Teaches Warning Signs of Rx Abuse and Diversion Aware Rx The National Association of Boards of Pharmacy (NABP) and the Anti-Diversion Industry Working Group (ADIWG), a consortium of pharmaceutical manufacturers and distributors, have released an educational video for pharmacists to help them identify the warning signs of prescription drug abuse and diversion when dispensing controlled substance prescriptions.
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PUBLIC POLICY AND REGULATORY NEWS
Veterans Affairs – VA Report Recommends Ongoing Drug Testing, Caution with Acetaminophen and Benzos for Outpatients on Opioids Veterans Affairs The VA Office of Inspector General conducted a study to assess the provision of VA outpatient (take-home) opioids and monitoring of patients on opioid therapy. The study describes both the prevalence of VA patients who filled any take-home opioid prescriptions at VA in 2012 and their baseline characteristics; evaluates VA dispensing patterns; and assesses the extent to which VA screens and monitors opioid patients.
Level of Intoxication Found to be Sole Main Effect Related to Sexual Risk Taking Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs Using hierarchical linear modeling, results indicated that level of intoxication was the sole significant main effect related to engaging in risky sexual behaviors; specifically, level of intoxication was positively related to sex with a poorly known partner...
Influenced but Unaware: Social Influence on Alcohol Drinking Among Social Acquaintances Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research Social acquaintances are influenced by each other's alcohol consumption and may not be aware of this influence on their behavior. Drinking partners may be influenced by each other's alcohol consumption. However, these effects have only been shown in artificially created social pairings and typically among same-sex young adults. This study tested whether similarly strong influence effects occur among "real" pairs of social acquaintances (friends and partners) and whether people are aware of this influence on their alcohol consumption.
The Effect of an Educational Intervention on Alcohol Consumption, At-Risk Drinking, and Health Care Utilization in Older Adults: The Project SHARE Study Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs The purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of a patient–provider educational intervention in reducing at-risk drinking among subjects. Intervention reduced alcohol consumption and at-risk drinking among seniors. Effects were sustained over a year and may have been associated with lower health care utilization, offsetting screening and intervention costs.
Developmental Trends of Eating Disorder Symptoms and Comorbid Internalizing Symptoms in Children and Adolescents Eating Behaviors Gender differences in eating pathology emerge between 12 and 15 years. The relationship between anxiety symptoms and eating pathology among both genders is weak and remains constant between the third and ninth grades. The relationship between depressive symptoms and eating pathology increases between the third and sixth grades for boys, and the sixth and ninth grades for girls.
Economists Slam the War on Drugs in New Report The Daily Beast In an 81-page report released last month, the best and brightest minds in the economic drug policy world sent the United Nations a loaded message about the drug war: Enough. The individual analyses of the economists and drug policy experts, signed by five Nobel Prize winners in economics, expose the collateral damage of the drug war and offer suggestions on how the policies can—and should—change.
The Neural Components of Empathy Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience Previous neuroimaging studies on empathy have not clearly identified neural systems that support the three components of empathy: affective congruence, perspective-taking, and prosocial motivation. In the current investigation, 32 participants completed a functional magnetic resonance imaging session assessing empathic responses to individuals experiencing painful, anxious, and happy events that varied in valence and amount of social context provided...
Risky Decision Making, Prefrontal Cortex, and Mesocorticolimbic Functional Connectivity in Methamphetamine Dependence JAMA Psychiatry Maladaptive decision making by methamphetamine users may reflect circuit-level dysfunction, underlying deficits in task-based activation. Heightened resting-state connectivity within the mesocorticolimbic system, coupled with reduced prefrontal cortical connectivity, may create a bias toward reward-driven behavior over cognitive control in methamphetamine users. Interventions to improve this balance may enhance treatments for stimulant dependence and other disorders that involve maladaptive decision making.
Opioid Overdose Prevention Programs ASAM The June issue of ASAM’s Journal of Addiction Medicine included a review about the use of naloxone for rapid drug reversal. Further study on naloxone’s impact on overdose deaths, the benefits of these prevention programs at the population level, and the effectiveness and implementation on opioid overdose prevention programs in existing treatment centers is recommended.
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The views and positions of any content published in ASAM Weekly are not necessarily endorsed by ASAM nor a reflection of ASAM's beliefs and policies. The features are presented as a summary of the contemporary issues being represented and expressed in scientific, governmental, commercial, and media sources across the specialty field of addiction medicine. Contact ASAM Weekly with any comments or feedback.