Prescription Pill Percentages Decreasing

Finally some good news for those with inpatient treatment centers and those involved with chemical dependency counseling. 

"A new government survey finds the number of young adults ages 18 to 25 who used prescription drugs for non-medical purposes in the past month declined 14 percent, from 2 million in 2010, to 1.7 million in 2011. Overall, the survey found a 12 percent decline in the number of Americans who abused prescription drugs.

The National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) also found that non-medical use of prescription drugs among children ages 12 to 17, and adults 26 or older, remained unchanged."

It's really encouraging news for those that work in a treatment center to see these percentages decreasing. 

"According to the survey, rates of past-month drinking, binge drinking and heavy drinking among those who are underage, are all on the decline. Marijuana use is up slightly, from 5.8 percent in 2007, to 7 percent in 2011. Tobacco use among teens ages 12 to 17 is down"

Source: http://www.drugfree.org/join-together/prescription-drugs/number-of-young-adul...

Pegasus Treatment Center provides hope and healing to those who are in the struggle against addiction. Our inpatient alcohol center brings you an empowering treatment facility that is beyond the best of all Orange County Treatment Centers. 

Empowering Teens Against Alcohol

Treatment centers are seening more and more teens every month and it's truly a sad thing. While we can't reverse time to prevent teens from using drugs and alchol, we can make a difference in their future by empowerment. 

"While it’s true that one in five teens binge drinks, it’s important to note that this means four out of five teens DON’T binge drink. Now, that is power. Teens need to feel empowered to make the right decisions about alcohol today, so they can look forward to a healthy, happy future. This includes making choices like saying no to alcohol and never getting in a car with someone who’s been drinking."

"One of these remarkable teens is Melissa Stegner, a 17-year-old high school senior from Clifton, VA. Melissa is an incredible example of activism born out of personal tragedy. Just after Christmas 2007, her father and 13-year-old brother were killed by a drunk driver. Since that horrific day, Melissa has been working tirelessly to make sure her peers know the dangers of underage drinking, and its correlation to drunk driving. She is making a difference in her local community, and is a true testament to the Power of You(th)."

You can read the full article at the source below and I really reccommend it. Today is the day to make a difference in someones life, not by clashing down on teens for their addictions, but by empowering them and respecting them to make the right choices.   

Source: http://www.drugfree.org/join-together/alcohol/commentary-empowering-youth-to-...

Pegasus Treatment Center provides hope and healing to those who are in the struggle against addiction. Our inpatient alcohol center brings you an empowering treatment facility that is beyond the best of all Orange County Treatment Centers. 

Recognizing David Arquette's Sobriety

This is a great article on David Arquette and his 2 years of sobriety. These are always great stories to hear about for those involved at treatment centers. 

"David Arquette is a celebrity who is a member of the Arquette acting family. He is best known as an actor, but he has also been a producer, director, professional wrestler and fashion designer. Arquette entered a rehab program in 2011 and says that he is still sober.

Career

Arquette got his start in major film work with the Scream series of slasher films. The first three films in this series were made in the late 1990s and the fourth was made in 2011. His early films also include Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Wild Bill.

He has also wrestled professionally, becoming the Heavyweight Champion in the World Championship Wrestling promotion in 2000. This result drew sharp criticism from commentators as contributing to the demise of WCW. Arquette also played the character of Jason Ventress on the In Case of Emergency, an ABC sitcom that ran for one season in 2007.

Marriage

Arquette met film and television actress Courteney Cox in 1999, while making the first Scream film in 1996. The couple’s only child is Coco Riley, who was born in 2004. Actress Jennifer Aniston is the godmother of Coco. The couple married in 2006, and Cox filed for divorce in 2009. She changed her mind a few months later, but the couple publicly announced a trial separation on October 11, 2010. At that time, Arquette told Howard Stern in an interview that he and Cox had not had sex during the past four months. The couple remained separated until their divorce was finalized in 2012.

Rehab

Arquette says that he experienced severe emotional issues due to his separation from Cox, and began drinking to excess. His alcohol consumption reached its peak on December 31, 2010, when he spent New Year’s Eve with Jeff Beacher at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel.

Arquette checked into a rehab facility the following day on January 1, 2011. His alcohol abuse was the primary reason for his admission, although he also admits to struggling with depression. Arquette has said that his family’s concerns were a significant factor in getting him to enter rehab.

Arquette discussed his recovery on an episode of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno that aired on April 8, 2011. He stated that he had just passed his 100th day of sobriety. Arquette returned to The Tonight Show on October 8, 2011, saying that he had been sober for more than nine months."

Source: http://www.freedomdrugrehab.com/celebrity-addictions/david-arquette-continues...

Pegasus Treatment Center provides hope and healing to those who are in the struggle against addiction. Our inpatient alcohol center brings you an empowering treatment facility that is beyond the best of all Orange County Treatment Centers. 

'Spice's effect on the Brain

Many people underestimate the effects of synthetic marijuana and end up going to a treatment center because they've formed an addiction. 

"High-potency marijuana, and the synthetic form of the drug, known as “K2” or “Spice,” can harm a developing embryo’s brain, a new study concludes. Many pregnant women are unaware of the risk, according to HealthDay.

The drugs can affect the brain as early as two weeks after conception, according to researchers at Texas A&M University. Marijuana is the most widely used illegal drug among pregnant women, they note in the journal Drug Testing and Analysis.

Exposure to high-potency or synthetic marijuana early in pregnancy can lead to anencephaly, a condition in which infants are born without large parts of their brain or skull, the researchers found. Early prenatal marijuana use also leads to attention-deficit/ hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), learning disabilities and memory problems in toddlers and 10-year-olds, and aggression, anxiety and depression in adolescents.

“The emergence of bioengineered crops and novel, medicinal marijuana strains, means that marijuana is no longer what it used to be in the 1970s and early 1980s,” study co-author Delphine Psychoyos said in a journal news release. “Some new, high-potency strains, including some medicinal marijuana blends, contain up to 20 times more THC, the psychoactive constituent of marijuana, than did ‘traditional’ marijuana,’” she said. “Furthermore, with the emergence of dispensaries and Internet websites, high potency marijuana and Spice products are now readily available to the general population.”"

Source: http://www.drugfree.org/join-together/drugs/high-potency-and-synthetic-mariju...

Pegasus Treatment Center provides hope and healing to those who are in the struggle against addiction. Our inpatient alcohol center brings you an empowering treatment facility that is beyond the best of all Orange County Treatment Centers. 

Dual Diagnosis Can be Better for Teens

An interesting article and report on teenagers and dual diagnosis from treatment centers. 

"Teenagers who receive substance abuse treatment at facilities with comprehensive mental health services fare better one year later, compared with those treated at facilities with fewer such services, or none at all, a new study finds.

Researchers at the RAND Corporation studied teenagers at three types of substance abuse treatment facilities. One group of 932 teens attended a site that had a psychiatrist and/or licensed social worker or psychologist on staff, and was able to offer comprehensive psychiatric services. A second group of 1,375 teens attended a site that could treat psychiatric conditions except for severe/persistent mental illness, and a third group of 1,210 teens attended a facility that could not treat psychiatric conditions.

After one year, teens who attended facilities that could treat all psychiatric conditions had lower average levels of substance use problems and substance use frequency compared with the other two groups.

“Half of adolescent substance abuse treatment facilities offer mental health services,” notes lead researcher Rajeev Ramchand, PhD, a behavioral scientist at RAND and a professor at the Pardee RAND Graduate School. “We wanted to look at whether youth who attended facilities that offered mental health treatment fared better than those who did not, because many people think that teens with a dual diagnosis of mental health issues and substance use disorder are the norm.”

Ramchand and his colleagues were surprised to find that the availability of mental health treatment at substance abuse treatment facilities made no difference in terms of symptoms of depression or conduct disorder. They presented their findings at the recent College on Problems of Drug Dependence annual meeting.

Since 2002, the proportion of adolescent substance abuse treatment facilities that offer mental health services has not changed much, noted Ramchand. “These facilities are facing real challenges. Many use public funds, and are always in jeopardy of losing funding. At the same time, they are being asked to expand mental health services, which are expensive, as well as other services, such as HIV testing.”

This study is one of a series that is looking at how adolescent substance abuse treatment can be improved and expanded. RAND is also looking at whether specific treatments that have been found effective in research studies can work well in a community treatment setting.

A government report released earlier this year found teenagers who experienced a major depressive episode in the past year had about twice the rate of illicit drug use compared with teens who had not experienced depression—37.2 percent versus 17.8 percent."

Source: http://www.drugfree.org/join-together/addiction/teens-fare-better-at-substanc...

Pegasus Treatment Center provides hope and healing to those who are in the struggle against addiction. Our inpatient alcohol center brings you an empowering treatment facility that is beyond the best of all Orange County Treatment Centers. 

What Doctors May Miss

It's not suprising for doctors to miss signs of addiction especially if the patient is not intoxicated at the time of inspection. This is why treatment centers can be so much more powerful than doctors and dual diagnosis can be a better tool. 

"Doctors often miss alcohol problems in their patients who are not intoxicated at the time of their visit, a new study finds.

The researchers analyzed studies that included a total of 20,000 patients assessed for alcohol problems by medical staff.  They found general practitioners identified 40 percent of problem drinkers, hospital physicians recognized 50 percent, and mental health specialists identified 55 percent, Science Daily reports.

“This study highlights that clinical identification of alcohol problems is challenging in busy clinical environments,” lead researcher Dr. Alex J. Mitchell of the University of Leicester in Great Britain, said in a news release. “When clinicians try and spot alcohol problems they often miss patients who have serious alcohol problems but who are not currently intoxicated.”

He noted that doctors are not always sure what questions to ask patients, or what screening tests to use. He added that in general, patients with alcohol problems admitted to them when asked.

The study appears in the British Journal of Psychiatry."

Source: http://www.drugfree.org/join-together/alcohol/alcohol-problems-often-missed-b...

Please take a look at our treatment center and inpatient treatment center page and support recovery! 

 

A Story Can Save a Life

This is what happens when treatment centers and inpatient alcohol centers take action and attempt to make a real difference! Stories are a powerful way to help not only spread awareness, but also potentially save lives! 

"At The Partnership at Drugfree.org, we know that the abuse of prescription and over-the-counter medications is one of the biggest public health problems in the United States today. In fact, every day, 2,000 teens use a prescription drug to get high for the first time.

This year, we are introducing “The Medicine Abuse Project,” a multi-year effort to raise awareness and curb the abuse of medicine by teens and young adults. Launching the week of September 23-29, 2012, the campaign will encourage and help parents and the public-at-large to help manage this problem, working toward the common goal of preventing 500,000 teens from abusing medicine within the next five years.

We need your help. Has your family been affected by prescription and over-the-counter medicine abuse? Has your teenager or another relative struggled with the misuse or abuse of medication? We want to hear from you.

Email us your story so that we can share it, potentially on our website and in the media, as part of the awareness campaign. By sharing your experience with others, you could help us take a substantial step toward stopping this deadly epidemic.

Visit The Medicine Abuse Project online to learn more about the campaign and other ways you can get involved."

Source: http://www.drugfree.org/newsroom/seeking-medicine-abuse-stories

Please send in your story and continue to support our treatment center by liking our Page! 

Bill Against Painkillers

This is great news for not just treatment centers and inpatient treatment centers, but also for America in general. Painkillers have been a leading cause of death in America and finally people are starting to take action and create safeguards.  

"A bill to be introduced Thursday in the U.S. House would require most painkillers to have safeguards to prevent abuse, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Under the provisions of the bill, most prescription painkillers would have some form of abuse deterrence, such as being more difficult to crush or inject. The exact details of how drug manufacturers could meet the new standards are vague, the article notes. The bill does not set time lines for compliance.

If pain medications did not adopt the safety features outlined in the bill, they would be removed from the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) approved list of generic drugs. While several brand-name painkillers, such as OxyContin and Opana, have tamper-resistant formulations, most generic painkillers do not.

Patents for OxyContin and Opana are set to expire in 2013. The FDA has not yet ruled whether abuse-deterrent features will be required on the generic versions of those drugs.

“This bill should help protect first-time users and younger people who gain access through relatives or their own family’s medicine cabinets,” the measure’s lead sponsor, Rep. Bill Keating of Massachusetts, told the newspaper. Congress is “understanding the scope of this and looking at it as a major public health epidemic,” he added.

He said there is broad bipartisan support in the House for the measure. The bill’s cosponsors are Republicans Mary Bono Mack of California and Hal Rogers of Kentucky, and Democrat Stephen Lynch of Massachusetts.

The Generic Pharmaceutical Association opposes the bill. “The proposed legislation would be detrimental to patients and could potentially remove FDA-approved safe and effective generic medicines from those who rely on them,” said the group’s president, Ralph G. Neas. “Addressing prescription-drug abuse is of utmost importance to the generic pharmaceutical industry. Policy makers should let the medical evidence guide actions in addressing this critical issue.”"

Source: http://www.drugfree.org/join-together/prescription-drugs/bill-would-require-m...

Pegasus Treatment Center provides hope and healing to those who are in the struggle against addiction. Our inpatient alcohol center brings you an empowering treatment facility that is beyond the best of all Orange County Treatment Centers. 

Teens and Cough Syrup

Though it may not seem like a big deal to a treatment center or inpatient alcohol center, teens abusing household items is a very big deal. It can easily start with something small like cough syrup and escalate to things like hard drugs. 

"Two senators introduced a bill this week designed to prevent the abuse of cough syrup by teenagers. The bill restricts the sale of products containing the cough syrup ingredient dextromethorphan (DXM) to those older than 18, Drug Store News reports.

Senator Bob Casey of Pennsylvania and Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska sponsored the measure, known as the Preventing Abuse of Cough Treatments (PACT) Act of 2012. The PACT Act also places limits on the purchase of bulk (unfinished) DXM, so that only manufacturers registered with the Food and Drug Administration or relevant state agencies have access to DXM in its raw form. Currently, there are no national restrictions on sales or purchase of DXM in this form.

The 2011 Monitoring the Future survey found that 5 percent of teens report abusing cough medicine. Abuse of DXM can cause hallucinations, confusion, blurred vision and loss of motor control.

The Consumer Healthcare Products Association (CHPA) notes that DXM is a safe and effective cough suppressant found in more than 100 cough and cold medicines. The legislation “will give parents an additional tool to prevent abuse, while ensuring access for the millions of adults and families who responsibly use products containing DXM to relieve cough symptoms,” CHPA  President and CEO Scott M. Melville said in a news release.

“By addressing easy access to purchasing cough syrup for teens, the main cause of the harmful trend of its abuse, my bill will help keep our children safe and lessen the strain cough syrup abuse has put on families, hospitals and law enforcement,” Senator Casey said in astatement. “My common-sense legislation will prevent kids from purchasing a drug that has dangerous consequences when abused to get high, while also ensuring it is available to those with a legitimate need for it.”"

Source: http://www.drugfree.org/join-together/drugs/bill-aims-to-reduce-teen-abuse-of...

Pegasus Treatment Center provides hope and healing to those who are in the struggle against addiction. Our inpatient alcohol center brings you an empowering treatment facility that is beyond the best of all Orange County Treatment Centers.

New Study Finds OxyContin Use Decreases

Though it may sound like good news at first if you take a look at the report you will find that OxyContin use has decreased, but Heroin is increasing. I'm looking forward to finding out the percentage of people that actually go to a treatment center after taking these drugs. 

"A new study finds that OxyContin abuse has decreased now that the painkiller has been reformulated to make it more difficult to misuse. Many people who abused the drug have switched to heroin, the researchers report in this week’s New England Journal of Medicine.

The study included more than 2,500 people who were dependent on opioids, who were followed between July 2009 and March 2012. During that time, there was a 17 percent decrease in OxyContin abuse. In 2010, the company that makes OxyContin introduced a new version of the drug that is more difficult to inhale or inject.

During the same period, heroin abuse doubled, ABC News reports.

“I think the message we have to take away from this is that there are both anticipated consequences and unanticipated consequences to these new formulas,” lead researcher Theodore Cicero of Washington University in St. Louis said. “Substance abuse is like a balloon: If you press in one spot, it bulges in another.”

The study found almost one-fourth of participants were able to abuse OxyContin despite the reformulation, and 66 percent switched to heroin. The article notes that a small bag of heroin can cost as little as $5, compared with an 80-milligram dose of OxyContin, which can cost up to $80 on the street.

“Our data show that an abuse-deterrent formulation successfully reduced abuse of a specific drug but also generated an unanticipated outcome: replacement of the abuse-deterrent formulation with alternative opioid medications and heroin, a drug that may pose a much greater overall risk to public health than OxyContin,” the researchers wrote. “Thus, abuse-deterrent formulations may not be the ‘magic bullets’ that many hoped they would be in solving the growing problem of opioid abuse.”

USA Today reported on Wednesday that misuse of the opioid Opanahas increased since OxyContin was reformulated."

Source: http://www.drugfree.org/join-together/addiction/as-oxycontin-abuse-drops-hero...

Pegasus Treatment Center provides hope and healing to those who are in the struggle against addiction. Our inpatient alcohol center brings you an empowering treatment facility that is beyond the best of all Orange County Treatment Centers. 

Teens and Medical Marijuana

This is a very interesting article for those who are involved with different inpatient treatment centers and the research seems to be pointing towards Medical Marijuana. 

"Three-quarters of teenage patients in substance abuse treatment programs in Denver, Colorado said they used someone else’s medical marijuana, according to a new study.

The study revealed that 121 of 164 teenage patients (73.8 percent) have ever used medical marijuana prescribed to someone else.  Patients reported using diverted medical marijuana from one to 1,000 times, with a median of 50 times, suggesting that most adolescent patients have used medical marijuana on multiple occasions, according to Stacy Salomonsen-Sautel, PhD, a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, Division of Substance Dependence. She reported the findings at the recent College on Problems of Drug Dependence, and the study appears online in the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.

The study found that after adjusting for gender and race/ethnicity, teenage patients who used medical marijuana had an earlier age of regular marijuana use, more marijuana abuse and dependence symptoms, and more conduct disorder symptoms, compared with those who did not use medical marijuana.

As of the end of April 2012, Colorado has 48 registered medical marijuana users under the age of 18. Four of the 164 teenage patients in the study reported being evaluated for a medical marijuana card; however, only one teenage patient received a medical marijuana card. According to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, 96,709 people in the state were registered as medical marijuana users as of April 30, 2012. This means 2.5 percent of the adults in Colorado are registered medical marijuana users, according to Salomonsen-Sautel.

“We don’t know what proportion of the marijuana they are using is medical marijuana,” Salomonsen-Sautel notes. She said the findings imply that there is substantial diversion from registered medical marijuana users. She and her colleagues say the results support the need for policy changes that protect against diversion of medical marijuana, and reduce teenager access to it."

Source: http://www.drugfree.org/join-together/drugs/74-percent-of-teens-in-co-substan...

Pegasus Treatment Center provides hope and healing to those who are in the struggle against addiction. Our inpatient alcohol center brings you an empowering treatment facility that is beyond the best of all Orange County Treatment Centers.

Treatment and The Supreme Court- Great News

This is great news for not just for Inpatient treatment centers, but also for those suffering from addiction. The U.S Supreme Court is making it easier for people with chronic illnesses to find help and make it affordable. 

"The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to uphold the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is extremely uplifting for the substance abuse field, according to A. Thomas McLellan, PhD, CEO of the Treatment Research Institute and former Deputy Director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy.

Dr. McLellan, who served on President Obama’s healthcare reform task force, notes the debates and research around the ACA produced two startling facts. “First, unaddressed substance use now costs mainstream healthcare upwards of $100 billion annually, particularly in areas such as ER and trauma care, but also in the treatment of virtually every chronic illness,” he said.

Dr. McLellan added that because of the severity and complexity of their conditions, the 23 million ‘addicted’ Americans are disproportionately costly – but it is the 40-45 million Americans with lower severity but still significant ‘harmful substance use disorders’ who comprise the largest burden of illness and cost to healthcare.

“The second realization produced in the ACA debates is that while there is provision to treat ‘addiction’ in specialty care programs (though clearly more coverage is needed) there had never been healthcare benefits or reimbursement options for those with ‘harmful substance use,’” he noted. “Thus, one of the historic aspects of ACA is the requirement that care services for the full range of substance use disorders be part of the ‘essential benefit design’ in all health plans.”

Dr. McLellan called this “the beginning of a new era in prevention, early intervention and office based care for patients who are not addicted – but whose drinking, smoking, and use of other substances is harming their health and compromising the effectiveness of the care they are receiving for other illnesses and conditions.”

The Supreme Court on Thursday largely upheld the constitutionality of the Obama Administration’s health care law. The mandate was upheld as a tax."

Source: http://www.drugfree.org/join-together/addiction/supreme-court-decision-%E2%80...

Pegasus Treatment Center provides hope and healing to those who are in the struggle against addiction. Our inpatient alcohol center brings you an empowering treatment facility that is beyond the best of all Orange County Treatment Centers. 

Adolescent Depression

Here is a great video that goes over teenage depression and how to make things get better. Treatment centers aren't only for addiction, but it can provide healing to depression and other problems as well :) 

If you enjoyed this video please give credit to Psych Central for recording and providing this content.

Pegasus Treatment Center provides hope and healing to those who are in the struggle against addiction and depression. Our inpatient alcohol center brings you an empowering treatment facility that is beyond the best of all Orange County Treatment Centers.