Answer Addiction

Tag: opioid crisis

  • Every 15 Minutes A Baby Dependent On Opioids Is Born

    Every 15 Minutes A Baby Dependent On Opioids Is Born

    New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof says drug executives should be held accountable for the growing number of infants born addicted to opioids.

    Instead of being lovingly swaddled and rocked in the first day of life, thousands of American infants are being treated for opioid withdrawal almost immediately after birth, a condition caused by exposure to opioids when they were in the womb. 

    At Charleston Area Medical Center in Charleston, West Virginia, neonatologist Stefan Maxwell says that up to 14 percent of babies are born dependent on opioids, according to The New York Times. Often, these infants experience painful and dangerous withdrawal symptoms that themselves need to be treated with opioids like methadone or morphine that can be tapered over the course of weeks. 

    “He’s frantic,” Maxwell said of one infant. “Baby isn’t sleeping, isn’t eating, isn’t growing. It’s a disaster.”

    Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome (NAS)

    Writing for the Times, columnist Nicholas Kristof detailed the prevalence of neonatal abstinence syndrome. The rise in rates of the condition can’t just be blamed on women who use drugs while pregnant. A system that peddled opioids and a healthcare system that woefully underfunds treatment are also to blame, he writes.  

    “Pharmaceutical executives are battling lawsuits by blaming drug users. I wish those executives had to cuddle these infants who, partly because of their reckless greed, suffer so much,” Kristof writes. “These drug-addicted newborns are suffering partly because of Johnson & Johnson, McKinsey, Purdue Pharma, McKesson and many other companies; these babies are a reminder of why corporate regulation is essential.”

    Neonatologist Cody Smith, who practices at Ruby Memorial Hospital in Morgantown, West Virginia, said most mothers are helpless in the face of addiction. Nearly all of them have unplanned pregnancies, and few have the resources to deal with their own trauma and mental health conditions, so they continue to use opioids while pregnant. 

    “Lots of these moms are very well meaning,” he said. “The vast majority of these moms love their babies, and they feel a tremendous amount of guilt.”

    Toll on Healthcare Providers

    Maxwell said that caring for infants in such destress can take a toll on healthcare providers. “Nurses are in tears at the end of a shift,” he said. 

    Kristof calls for punishing those at the root of the addiction epidemic, as well as providing support for vulnerable women and babies. 

    “We need accountability, as well as deterrence,” he writes. “That means sending executives to prison along with other big drug dealers, and ensuring that shareholders in these companies suffer as well.”

    He continues, “Anyone doubting the need for tougher accountability, and for a far more robust public health approach to address drug use, should visit one of these nurseries and see babies suffering withdrawal.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Small-Town Ohio Physician Ordered 1.6M Pain Pills in Four Years 

    Small-Town Ohio Physician Ordered 1.6M Pain Pills in Four Years 

    According to her attorney, Dr. Margaret Temponeras’ inappropriate prescribing was the result of being misled by pharmaceutical companies.

    A feature in the online edition of the Cleveland Plain Dealer examines the circumstances behind a family physician in a southern Ohio suburb who, by ordering more than 1.6 million opioid pills, was credited by federal and state authorities for allegedly helping to fuel the state’s opioid overdose crisis.

    The State Medical Board has accused Dr. Margaret Temponeras of prescribing painkillers for “other than a legitimate medical reason” and to patients who showed clear signs of dependency between 2006 and 2011 from a pain clinic and dispensary she operated. 

    Guilty Plea

    After federal authorities raided her offices in 2015, Temponeras pled guilty to a charge of drug conspiracy in 2017, and is currently awaiting sentencing. Her attorney was quoted in the Plain Dealer as saying that the doctor was misled by pharmaceutical firms, which according to the article, have paid millions of dollars to settle lawsuits over their alleged contributions to the opioid crisis in Ohio, which ranked fourth on a list of the states that received the highest amount of prescription painkillers between 2006 and 2012.

    It Was a Family Affair

    According to the Statement of Facts cited by the Department of Justice press release, Temponeras, who operated a family practice in Wheelersburg, Ohio, also opened a pain management clinic in the town, her father, gynecologist Dr. John Temponeras, also worked at the clinic. From 2005 until 2011, the pair saw more than 20 patients a day, who paid $200 and $225 in cash for examinations. Federal records indicated that in some cases, patients drove to the clinic from Kentucky and West Virginia.

    Patients received monthly prescriptions for oxycodone and Xanax, some of which were filled by her father; records show that their office ordered more than 107,000 pills in 2008, which rose to more than 655,000 the following year and to more than 800,000 in 2010. Medi-Mart Pharmacy in Portsmouth, Ohio, initially filled many of the prescriptions but when DEA officials began warning local pharmacists about Temponeras’s prescribing habits, she began filling prescriptions at her clinic, where employees – none of whom were pharmacists – handled medication. The Plain Dealer noted that state law at the time did not require a solo practitioner’s office to have a license to dispense drugs.

    Top Opioid Prescriber

    By 2012, Temponeras ranked 18th on a national list of practitioners who ordered opioids between 2006 and 2012, with some 1.66 million pain pills placed by her office. The Plain Dealer noted that more than 1.4 million were obtained from Miami-Luken, a pharmaceutical wholesale distributor in southwest Ohio that was indicted on drug conspiracy charges in 2018 for selling millions of opioids throughout southern Ohio, Kentucky and West Virginia while also failing to report suspicious orders to the DEA. During testimony before a U.S House subcommittee, Miami-Luken’s chairman of the board mentioned Temponeras as someone they “never should have supplied” with medication due to the large amounts she had ordered.

    In 2011, state and federal agents raided Temponeras’s offices, resulting in the permanent loss of both her and her father’s medical licenses. Both were also indicted, along with Medi-Mart Pharmacy owner Raymond Fankell, by a federal grand jury. 

    All three pled guilty to conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance, which carries a possible jail sentence of up to 20 years. As of the publication of the Plain Dealer article on September 1st, all three are free on bond.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • 'Kingpin Within the Drug Cartel' Tries to Avoid Federal Opioid Trial

    'Kingpin Within the Drug Cartel' Tries to Avoid Federal Opioid Trial

    Mallinckrodt has proposed to settle with two Ohio counties, which would allow the drug maker to avoid a forthcoming federal opioid trial in October.

    Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals, a lesser known but still a major player in opioid manufacturing, has reached a tentative settlement with two Ohio counties as part of federal opioid litigation. 

    Mallinckrodt agreed to pay $24 million to Cuyahoga and Summit Counties and donate $6 million in pharmaceuticals, including addiction treatment drugs, to those counties, The New York Times reported. 

    The Proposed Settlement

    The settlement would allow Mallinckrodt to avoid being part of the first federal bellwether trial of drug makers, distributors and retailers, which is slated to begin in October. The agreement “gives us the necessary time to continue to work towards a global resolution of the opioid lawsuits,” Mallinckrodt’s General Counsel Mark Casey said in a statement. 

    Judge Dan Polster has pushed for a settlement in the opioid lawsuits, which include more than 2,300 suits from cities, states and counties. 

    Although it is common in settlements for documents relating to the case to be sealed, most of the documentation in the federal opioid cases will remain open. That’s significant, said Adam Zimmerman, a law professor in Los Angeles. 

    “It means that all of this information in the federal litigation, which is so vital to our understanding about what happened, how we got here, will remain open,” he said. 

    DEA Called It the ‘Kingpin Within the Drug Cartel’

    Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals isn’t as well known as Purdue Pharma or Johnson & Johnson, but the company played a massive role in the opioid epidemic, authorities say. The company controlled 38% of opioid sales between 2006 and 2012. Purdue, for comparison, held just 3% of the market during that time. 

    Barbara J. Boockholdt, former chief of the regulatory section at DEA’s Office of Diversion, said even she didn’t realize how massive Mallinckrodt’s hold was until she checked the data. 

    “I was shocked; I couldn’t believe it, Mallinckrodt was the biggest, and then there was Actavis,” she told The Washington Post. “Everyone had been talking about Purdue, but they weren’t even close.”

    The details of the settlement have not yet been finalized. However, the funds and the pharmaceuticals will give “both counties critically needed resources in the ongoing response to the opioid crisis as well as protection in any future insolvency proceeding by Mallinckrodt,” lawyers for the counties said in a statement. 

    The company’s stock fell up to 40% after reports emerged saying that Mallinckrodt was exploring bankruptcy, but president and CEO Mark Trudeau said those reports were unfounded. That caused stock to rebound partially. Trudeau added that his company will likely stop selling opioids. 

    He said, “Fundamentally we are just not the best owners of this business.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Woman Stole Pills from Open Houses, Realtors Say

    Woman Stole Pills from Open Houses, Realtors Say

    An Ohio woman has been accused of going to open houses to steal from homeowners’ medicine cabinets.

    Homeowners considering hosting an open house might think that the worst thing they’ll have to deal with is nosey neighbors poking around, but law enforcement in Ohio says that people trying to sell their houses encountered something much more egregious: a woman who attended open houses just so she could steal prescription pills. 

    Officials from the Franklin County Sheriff’s Office told 10TV that Amanda Haislar spent three weeks going to open houses and raiding the medicine cabinets. Authorities were tipped off by real estate agents who noticed Haislar’s suspicious behavior, said Detective Sergeant Mike Weiner with the Franklin County Sheriff’s Office.

    “We were contacted by a couple of realtors that were aware of what was going on,” Weiner said. 

    Catching Her in the Act

    To catch Haislar in the act, police set up cameras in a home that was scheduled to have an open house, which they suspected Haislar would attend. The video evidence showed that Haislar headed right for the medicine cabinets in the home. 

    “She was looking for prescription medication—hydrocodone, Vicodin,” Weiner said. “It was clear to me that she knew exactly what she was looking for. She knew where the items were located. It was a direct path to where she knew she wanted to go.”

    To cover her tracks, Haislar replaced the prescription pills with aspirin, potentially putting the homeowners at risk because they were not getting their proper medications. 

    A Result of the Drug Crisis

    Weiner said that Haislar’s actions show just how bad the opioid epidemic is, and the lengths that people will go to access prescription pills. Ohio has been one of the states hardest hit by the opioid epidemic. Although Weiner hasn’t seen people take advantage of open houses before, he has seen the other ways that opioid addiction influences someone to break the law. 

    “In my experience as an investigator with the Sheriff’s office, this is the first time I’ve seen this specific tactic used by a person to obtain these drugs,” he said. However, it’s far from the first time that he’s seen someone turn to illegal means to support their addiction. 

    “All the other crime that is associated with it, property theft, stuff like that, all goes up to support those addictions,” Weiner said.

    It’s not clear whether Haislar was selling the pills or using them for personal use. She was arrested, but it was not clear what charges she will face for stealing the pills. 

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Courtney Love Refuses to "Sell Out" to OxyContin Heiress at NYFW, Takes It to Instagram

    Courtney Love Refuses to "Sell Out" to OxyContin Heiress at NYFW, Takes It to Instagram

    “This request from Joss Sackler is shameless and offensive after everything I, many of my friends, and millions of other addicts have been through with OxyContin,” Love told Page Six.

    Manhattan socialite Joss Sackler could not escape the controversy of her family name during this year’s New York Fashion Week.

    Ahead of the NYFW presentation of her line, “LBV care of Joss Sackler,” on Monday, Page Six reported that the “OxyContin heiress” offered more than $100,000 and a dress sewn with 24 carat gold thread to Courtney Love to attend the show.

    Ties to OxyContin

    The Sackler Family owns Purdue Pharma, the manufacturer of OxyContin. Purdue is fighting a barrage of lawsuits alleging that the pharmaceutical company played a role in fueling the opioid crisis. The company is currently negotiating a settlement ahead of a much anticipated federal trial scheduled to begin in October.

    State attorneys general have vowed to go after the family’s wealth as retribution. “I won’t let them get away with their crimes,” said Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro on Twitter. “I will sue them personally, so that we can dig into their personal pocketbooks.”

    David Sackler, Joss’s husband, is the grandson of Raymond Sackler, one of the three company’s founders. David served on Purdue’s board of directors from 2012 to 2018, before the couple “fled town” to escape the controversy, as Page Six reported in May, trading their $6.5 million Upper East Side apartment for a place in Palm Beach, Florida.

    Rejected by Courtney Love

    Joss Sackler and her team, who are “huge fans” of Courtney Love, assured the Hole rocker that “The brand has no relation to Purdue… other than Joss is married to the family,” according to Page Six.

    But Love wasn’t having it. “I am one of the most famous reformed junkies on the planet—my husband died on heroin—what is it about me that says to Joss Sackler, ‘I will sell out to you?’ Well I won’t.”

    She continued, telling Page Six, “This request from Joss Sackler is shameless and offensive after everything I, many of my friends, and millions of other addicts have been through with OxyContin.” Love is sober but says she will “always be an opioid addict… I am just in recovery.”

    Sackler countered, posting an email screenshot suggesting that Love, instead of rejecting her offer, sought “$275,000 minimum” to attend Sackler’s NYFW event. She wrote “Fake news” in the caption and tagged Love’s Instagram handle. Love responded: “Check me out you bitch. Come for me. Lying sack of #sacklerlies shit.”

    Fashion Show

    Sackler’s event went ahead as planned on Monday at the Bowery Hotel Terrace. The atmosphere was described by one journalist as “redolent of defiant wealth.”

    A friend of the family, Jaya Karamores, defended Joss. “It’s unfair,” she told the Daily Beast. “She’s her own woman and people should see the line before they open their mouths. All she’s seen as is a man’s wife. For her to run a business is amazing.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • OxyContin Maker Expected To File for Bankruptcy

    OxyContin Maker Expected To File for Bankruptcy

    Purdue Pharma is expected to file for bankruptcy protection as the company reportedly failed to settle thousands of opioid lawsuits against them.

    After years of reaping massive profits from allegedly deceptive marketing practices around its opioid painkillers, Purdue Pharma is expected to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy soon, since negotiations to reach a settlement in the scores of lawsuits against the company have failed. 

    Tennessee Attorney General Herbert Slatery and North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein updated attorneys general around the country over the weekend, and their letter was obtained by the Associated Press. 

    “As a result, the negotiations are at an impasse, and we expect Purdue to file for bankruptcy protection imminently,” Slatery and Stein wrote. 

    A spokesperson for Purdue responded, “Purdue declines to comment on that in its entirety.” In March, Reuters first reported that Purdue was exploring bankruptcy, although there was no official word from the company. 

    Filing for Bankruptcy

    If Purdue Pharma does make a move to file for bankruptcy, it would complicate more than 2,000 lawsuits that municipalities and states around the country have filed against the company. It would almost certainly mean that Purdue would not be part of the opioid lawsuit taking place in federal court Ohio. The first trial in that batch is expected to start next month. 

    One speculation is that a bankruptcy payout from Purdue could be worth $10 to $12 billion over time, but others say that the payout could be as little as $1 billion, which is small considering the amount of lawsuits against the company.

    Seeking Damages

    Attorneys vowed that they would continue to seek damages from the company. 

    “Like you, we plan to continue our work to ensure that the Sacklers, Purdue and other drug companies pay for drug addiction treatment and other remedies to help clean up the mess we allege they created,” Slatery and Stein wrote in their letter. 

    In some cases, states are personally suing the Sackler family, which has reportedly pulled billions of dollars out of Purdue and moved that personal wealth offshore. Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro is among those who plans to sue the Sackler family. 

    “I think they are a group of sanctimonious billionaires who lied and cheated so they could make a handsome profit,” he said. “I truly believe that they have blood on their hands.”

    Shapiro took to Twitter Saturday to emphasize his point. 

    “The Sacklers pioneered our #OpioidEpidemic,” he wrote. “They have blood on their hands. And on behalf of PA’ns, I will sue them personally, so that we can dig into their personal pockets & retrieve some of the money they made. We need this for treatment and other life saving efforts.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Doctors Prescribe More Opioids Late In The Day, When Running Late

    Doctors Prescribe More Opioids Late In The Day, When Running Late

    Time constraints and “chaotic practice environments” may be to blame for the troubling reliance on prescriptions.

    Doctors are significantly more likely to prescribe opioid pain pills later in the day or when their appointments are running behind schedule, according to a new study. 

    The study, published in JAMA Network Open, looked at records from nearly 700,000 primary care appointments. The study authors found that doctors were 33% more likely to prescribe opioids late in their day than they were during their earlier appointments. In addition, appointments running behind schedule increased the likelihood of an opioid being prescribed by 17%. 

    It’s often mentioned that time constraints on patient appointments cause doctors to turn to prescriptions, rather than engaging to find alternative treatments, a process that can take much longer. The researchers wanted to use measurements and data to see if that is truly the case. 

    A Long-Suspected Factor in Overprescription

    “Many observers have blamed chaotic practice environments (ie, increasing financial pressure, productivity expectations, and the cognitive effort of caring for complex patient populations) for high rates of opioid prescribing because opioids can be a quick fix for a visit where pain is a symptom,” study authors write. “The concept that time pressure can drive physician decision-making is long-standing, but little empirical literature has examined the existence of this phenomenon or its magnitude.”

    They found that the theory did hold up, across all providers. 

    “Physicians were significantly more likely to prescribe opioids as the workday progressed and as appointments started later than scheduled,” they wrote. 

    Awareness of Bias May Help Reduce Opioid Dependence

    The researchers said that there are vast difference in prescription rates between individual doctors and hospitals that can’t be explained just looking at the the time of day of appointments. However, they point out that the difference in prescribing at different times of the day can also help explain some of the difference in prescribing between different providers.

    “Full-time clinicians may have higher opioid prescribing rates simply because of the effort involved in long clinical days,” they wrote. “Sharing individual data on these patterns with physicians could raise awareness of this bias and help them develop approaches such as schedule modifications to lower the burden of taxing or time-consuming decisions late in the day.”

    On a national level, addressing this difference could help reduce opioid prescriptions and ultimately lead to fewer people becoming dependent on opioids. 

    “If similar patterns exist in other clinical scenarios, such as managing challenging chronic illness, this phenomenon could have relevance for public health and quality improvement efforts,” the study authors write. 

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Top Treatment Options for Liquicet Addiction

    Top Treatment Options for Liquicet Addiction

    Questions about Liquicet addiction? Find your answers by using this helpful guide.

    1. What is This Medication and How is it Used?
    2. Development of Hydrocodone/ Acetaminophen Addiction
    3. Potential Indicators of Opioid Problems in Hydrocodone/ Acetaminophen Users
    4. Detox as Preparation for Active Addiction Treatment
    5. Program Settings for Treatment
    6. Types of Effective Treatments for Opioid or Opiate Addiction
    7. Picking the Best Prescription Drug Addiction Program for Your Needs

    Are you or your loved one dealing with the damaging effects of Liquicet addiction? You can recover if you seek help in an effective treatment program for prescription drug addiction. Effective programs can be easy to find if you know what you’re looking for. With the information provided in this article, you can begin your recovery efforts from a position of knowledge and understanding.

    What is This Medication and How is it Used?

    Liquicet is a prescription drug that contains a combination of two medications: hydrocodone bitartrate and acetaminophen. Hydrocodone is a powerful painkiller belonging to the opioid or opiate family of substances. Acetaminophen is a less powerful, non-opioid pain reliever. The medication comes in the form of an oral liquid. Doctors prescribe it as a treatment for back pain and other forms of pain with a moderate or moderately severe level of intensity.

    Liquicet belongs to a larger group of hydrocodone/acetaminophen products that includes Lorcet, Xodol, Hycet, Vicodin, Lortab and Zolvit. It has no generic equivalent, although other medications of this type do come in generic form. Common street names for hydrocodone and medications like Lorcet that combine hydrocodone with other pain relievers include:

    • Watson-387
    • Vikes

    Development of Hydrocodone/Acetaminophen Addiction

    Acetaminophen is an over-the-counter medication. However, hydrocodone belongs to a group of opiate or opioid substances categorized as Schedule II prescription drugs. All Schedule II drugs have proven themselves useful in some form of medical treatment. Unfortunately, along with this usefulness comes the ability to alter your mind in ways that lead to a state of dependence. (You’re dependent on a medication if you need to keep using it in order to feel “normal” or maintain daily function.) And any Schedule II drug that can trigger substance dependence can also trigger substance addiction, especially in people who take part in medication abuse.

    You can abuse hydrocodone/acetaminophen or any other prescription drug in more ways than one. For example, abuse occurs whenever a current prescription holder takes the part-opioid pain reliever without waiting the appropriate length of time between doses. A prescription holder can also abuse the medication by taking too much of it at once. Given these facts, it’s obvious that you also abuse hydrocodone/acetaminophen if you take too much of it and use it too often. A fourth category of prescription drug abuse includes people who take the medication without the current consent of a doctor.

    Serious abuse of any hydrocodone/acetaminophen product can qualify you for a diagnosis of an officially defined illness called OUD or opioid use disorder. Addiction to one of these products is also diagnosed as part of the same condition. At its milder end, OUD produces two or three symptoms of abuse and/or addiction. In its moderate form, the disorder produces four or five symptoms. In its severe form, opioid use disorder can leave you with six to 11 abuse/addiction symptoms.

    Potential Indicators of Opioid Problems in Hydrocodone/Acetaminophen Users

    • The existence of a habitual pattern of hydrocodone/acetaminophen abuse
    • Lack of success in keeping your prescription drug intake under control, even when you try your best
    • The presence of an intense urge to consume more hydrocodone/acetaminophen
    • The formation of a daily routine that makes support of your ongoing medication abuse a top priority
    • Habitual consumption of hydrocodone/acetaminophen at a level that leaves you unable to meet reasonable performance expectations at work, at school or at home
    • Rising tolerance to the prescription drug (marked by recurring increases in the amount you normally consume)
    • Withdrawal symptoms that arise if you make rapid decreases in your level of hydrocodone/acetaminophen consumption or halt your consumption completely
    • A pattern of prescription drug abuse that you insist on maintaining despite knowing that it harms your health
    • A pattern of abuse that you insist on maintaining despite knowing how it negatively influences your most important social or personal ties to other people
    • Establishment of hydrocodone/acetaminophen abuse as a go-to form of recreation
    • A recurring tendency to abuse hydrocodone/acetaminophen in dangerous or high-risk settings or environments

    Detox as Preparation for Active Addiction Treatment

    To create a foundation for progress in Liquicet addiction treatment, you must start with a period of time dedicated to detoxification or detox. Detox makes further progress possible in two ways. First, during this preliminary phase of your recovery, you bring an end to your current habit of hydrocodone/acetaminophen abuse. Along with this change in your intake habits comes a necessary drop in the amount of opioid or opiate circulating in your body.

    During detox, anyone with a hydrocodone addiction will go through an unpleasant phase of chemical adjustment known as withdrawal. Withdrawal is basically the same, no matter which specific substance acts as the source of your opiate addiction. Its early effects on your mind and body can include tender muscles, abnormal yawning, abnormal sweating and abnormal feelings of anxiety. Additional possible effects at this stage include changes in your normal sleep habits and a runny nose.

    New and different symptoms of withdrawal will appear as detox continues. Late-stage effects can include such things as loose stools and nausea with or without bouts of vomiting. They can also include unusually wide or dilated pupils, cramps in your abdomen and goosebumps that linger instead of fading away.

    When detox comes to an end, it’s time for enrollment in a rehab program for prescription drug addiction. You cannot skip this follow-up treatment if you hope to maximize your chances of recovering from your opiate problems. That’s true because failure to enroll in an appropriate program increases the odds that you will relapse and return to your prior pattern of hydrocodone abuse. And in a not-uncommon scenario, your return to opioid abuse can lead to a fatal or non-fatal overdose. Overdoses in these circumstances are often caused by the reduction in your opioid tolerance that occurs during detox.

    You may feel capable of going through detox and withdrawal on your own. However, instead of recommending this go-it-alone approach, addiction specialists universally recommend that you seek help in a supervised medical detox program. This type of program is your best bet for making it safely through withdrawal while limiting your potential exposure to a relapse. Since you’re under a doctor’s care, you can also receive help whenever you need it if any serious detox-related problems arise. In addition, your doctor has the opportunity to check you for other potential issues, including alcohol problems or mental illness.

    Program Settings for Treatment

    If you’re like the vast majority of people, you can go directly from supervised detox to active addiction treatment in an outpatient or inpatient opioid/opiate program. Outpatient treatment provides the help needed for your recovery while allowing you to keep living at home. As a rule, it’s only a recommended option for people who have a mild form of opioid use disorder. If you fall into this category, outpatient programs can make it simpler to meet your treatment needs without making major alterations to your daily routine.

    Despite the scheduling convenience of outpatient treatment for opiate addiction, experts in the field still view residential treatment in an inpatient program as the primary model for effective care. That’s because residential programs provide you with complete access to medical support while you follow your personalized recovery plan. They also allow you to put other daily demands out of mind as you focus your efforts on participating in your treatment.

    Inpatient care is the standard for just about everyone with moderate or severe symptoms of opioid use disorder. However, it’s also sometimes indicated for people with mild OUD symptoms. For example, you may prefer this option if you don’t think your personal support network is strong enough to help you stay sober while receiving outpatient care. In addition, your doctor may ask you to enroll in an inpatient program if you have mild OUD symptoms combined with any type of major mental illness.

    Types of Effective Treatments for Opioid or Opiate Addiction

    Today, Liquicet addiction and all other serious opioid problems are addressed by combining medication-based treatment with therapy designed to alter your addiction-related thoughts and behaviors. The most widely used medications reserved for this purpose are the Schedule II opioid methadone and the weaker opioid buprenorphine. 

    Some people have the mistaken perception that use of these substances is inappropriate for the treatment of opioid addiction. However, both methadone and buprenorphine have proven themselves as effective and safe when used as intended. Either option can help you control your risks for a relapse while limiting the severity of your withdrawal symptoms.

    If you undergo complete detox and no longer have any opiates in your system, your medication treatment plan may also include naltrexone. When circulating in your system, naltrexone essentially functions as a shutdown switch for any opiates trying to reach your brain. Since you can’t get “high” while taking this medication, it helps you avoid the urge to relapse.

    The therapy used to help people with OUD is classified as behavioral psychotherapy. In one way or another, all forms of behavioral therapy help you establish ways of thinking and acting that steer you away from any future substance abuse. The list of possible options in any given treatment program include:

    • Motivational incentive therapy or motivational interviewing
    • Contingency management
    • Community reinforcement approach (CRA) plus vouchers

    You may also take part in something called 12-step facilitation. This therapy option is intended to help you recognize the benefits of enrolling in opioid-oriented self-help groups modeled after similar groups for alcohol problems. A fifth helpful approach is family behavior therapy. This technique gives you and your loved ones the chance to identify and change family-based issues that help create an environment favoring substance abuse.

    Picking the Best Prescription Drug Addiction Program for Your Needs

    When picking a program to help you recover from opiate addiction, you must first understand what separates sub-par rehabilitation facilities from facilities that produce positive results. The quickest way to identify options that you want to explore further is to look for programs that offer the types of medication and therapy recommended by experts. Any addiction center that doesn’t meet this minimum standard just isn’t worth your time.

    Assessment of your OUD symptoms and all other mental and physical health issues should be one of the first steps in any reputable program’s enrollment process. Be aware that only an experienced addiction specialist can conduct this kind of assessment with the proper level of insight and accuracy. Specialists and well-trained support personnel should also be used in every other area of the program.

    You may be able to clarify all of these issues by reviewing information on each program’s website. If not, your should get everything you need by contacting facilities on your short list and asking them questions. If you’re uncertain about anything, the conversations you have should clear them up.

    To boost your chances of recovering from hydrocodone addiction, you probably want to consider programs that do more than provide you with the basic elements of sound, effective treatment. You can identify options in this category by looking for a few key indicators. One of the biggest signs of quality is a clear emphasis on holistic care that treats your whole person, rather than just targeting your specific addiction symptoms. This kind of personalized support can make all the difference in your short- and long-term recovery.

    Top programs also tend to do additional things to help make your enrollment as beneficial as possible. For instance, they may feature luxurious facilities or desirable locations. In addition, they may offer secondary treatment options that reinforce the goals of your primary care plan.

    No matter what choice you make for your treatment facility, bear in mind that your own personal commitment plays a key role in your recovery. Your patience and focused effort will help you make a life of stable sobriety a realistic possibility.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Hasan Minhaj: Drug Companies, This Crisis Is On You

    Hasan Minhaj: Drug Companies, This Crisis Is On You

    Minhaj chronicled the opioid epidemic and the rise of fentanyl on a recent episode of his Netflix show Patriot Act.

    While drug companies like Purdue Pharma, McKesson and Johnson & Johnson fight accusations that they were major contributors to the opioid crisis, a recent episode of Netflix’s Patriot Act came to a clear conclusion. Drug companies, “this crisis is on you.” 

    The newest episode of Patriot Act—which has covered everything from the dark side of the video game industry to student loans to the streetwear giant Supreme—explores fentanyl.

    The Rise Of Painkillers

    Minhaj chronicles the rise of prescription opiates like OxyContin, and how that led to rising heroin use followed by rising fentanyl use, often referred to as the “third wave” of the opioid epidemic.

    When it was created, fentanyl was intended to treat only severe and intractable pain experienced by cancer patients and those undergoing surgery. However, more people were given access to the powerful synthetic opioid—said to be about 100 times more potent than morphine—for far less severe ailments. 

    Minhaj cited a JAMA report that revealed that up to half (55.4%) of patients who were prescribed fentanyl painkillers were ineligible for the drug.

    The Washington Post reported in February of this year, “The researchers concluded that prescribers, pharmacists, drug companies and the FDA—all of whom had agreed to special rules and monitoring for use of the powerful opioid—had allowed it to fall into the hands of thousands of inappropriate patients. Over time, the FDA and drug companies became aware this was happening but took no action, the researchers found.”

    Why were so many doctors prescribing these powerful and addictive drugs inappropriately? Minhaj points to the drug companies, who have been found to promote these drugs through unorthodox (and questionable) means. 

    Insys Therapeutics, which went bankrupt just days after agreeing to pay $225 million to settle criminal and civil cases with the federal government, was revealed to have employed bizarre rap videos and even lap dancing to entice doctors to prescribe their fentanyl spray, Subsys.

    Profiting On The Antidote

    Now, companies like Insys and Cephalon (owned by Teva Pharmaceuticals) are banking on naloxone sales.

    “They’re unleashing the plague and also selling the antidote,” Minhaj said. “These companies helped fuel the fentanyl crisis on both ends, legal and illegal. When they marketed legal fentanyl to patients who didn’t need it, a lot of people ended up getting hooked. And that intensified the appetite for illegal fentanyl, which is leveling so many communities across the country.”

    But somehow, with tens of thousands of Americans dying from opioid-related causes each year, we still have not learned our lesson, Minhaj noted.

    Just last November, the Food and Drug Administration approved an even more powerful opioid, Dsuvia, a pill 10 times stronger than fentanyl and up to 1000 times stronger than morphine. Critics called the move “reckless.”

    “What could possibly go wrong? We know the problems this is going to bring,” Minhaj said. “How do we make sure this drug only gets to the right people? How do we make sure people don’t get addicted to it? And how do we make sure it doesn’t start killing people like the people I knew who never even intended to take it in the first place?” 

    “Unless you can answer those questions, guess what, pharmaceutical companies? This crisis is on you.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Toni Braxton’s Niece Died From Heroin, Fentanyl Intoxication At 24

    Toni Braxton’s Niece Died From Heroin, Fentanyl Intoxication At 24

    The Grammy award-winning singer’s niece passed away in late April. 

    Lauren Braxton, niece of renowned singer Toni Braxton, died of “heroin and fentanyl intoxication” at the age of 24 years old, according to the Chief Medical Examiner’s Office in Baltimore, Maryland.

    The specific manner in which Lauren died remains “undetermined.”

    Law enforcement, responding to a 911 call placed at roughly noon on Monday, April 29th, found Lauren unresponsive. Paramedics at the scene declared her dead.

    She was the daughter of Toni’s brother, Michael Conrad Braxton Junior. Toni herself was out of country at the time of Lauren’s death, attending the Tobago Jazz Festival in Trinidad and Tobago.

    “R.I.P. to my amazing niece Lauren “Lo Lo” Braxton…I’m still in disbelief and so very heartbroken Love you…always auntie “Te Te,” wrote Toni in an Instagram post mourning her niece’s death.

    The Braxton Family Posted Tributes Online

    Other members of the Braxton clan mourned Lauren’s death.

    “God sent me another angel! Rest in Heaven Lauren ‘LoLo’ Braxton,” wrote Trina Braxton in her own tribute post.

    The Braxton family shares the spotlight on their television show, Braxton Family Values. Toni, Michael, and Trina appear on the show alongside sisters Traci, Towanda, and Tamar.

    Tamar also took to Instagram to express sadness at the loss, sharing that this was the first time she has experienced the death of a family member in an Instagram live broadcast. The hit came at an especially bad time for Tamar, who is touring while still making appearances on Braxton Family Values. 

    “I’ve been M.I.A. because I just cannot bring myself to post about my niece. Like, I just can’t do it,” she said in her four-minute Instagram live video. “But what I did want to say is I want to thank everyone for sending their condolences.”

    As a result of the emotional stress and the busy schedule, Tamar announced she would not attend Lauren’s funeral service.

    Tamar Braxton Announces She Won’t Attend Lauren’s Funeral 

    “I don’t want my sisters or my family to get upset with me, but the things that’s been going on — this is the first time that anybody in my family has passed. Nobody tell you about going to the damn funeral. I don’t have time going to the funeral,” she continued in the video. “I’m still drained from that… It’s a lot. Everything happens in God’s divine order and you’ve got to respect it and praise him anyway.”

    Instagram users did not like Tamar’s reasoning.

    “Get..your a— up and go to the funeral for 2 hours then get back in your bed. I’m not hearing this excuse,” wrote one user.

    On Lauren’s Instagram account, users and fans have left messages of condolence by the thousands.

    View the original article at thefix.com