AAN on Pregant Women and Addiction

The United States has come a long way in regard to putting an end to draconian drug laws. We are still far from the goal of decriminalizing addiction, a form of mental illness, but there is hope that one day, treatment will be the answer to all things mental health.

In many states across the country, the response to a low-level drug offense (simple possession for instance) is drug court. More and more people are being offered treatment over jail. Lawmakers are slowly discovering that addiction is not a problem that we can sweep under the rug, i.e., arrest away. For the first time, politicians are acknowledging that the “war on drugs” has done far more harm than good.

As the nation continues to wrestle with the opioid use disorder crisis, one that steals roughly 130 lives each day, compassion is quickly becoming a primary response. Stigmatizing and demonizing addicts harms us all. Who among us does not know someone who has struggled with addiction?

We are, all of us, touched by the deadly epidemic of addiction and the solution is treatment and long-term recovery. States and municipalities across the U.S. now realize that when those struggling find empowerment they are more likely to seek assistance. With help, individuals can avoid becoming an overdose death statistic. While many opioid addicts are finding that society is exercising a more compassionate understanding of addiction, at least one demographic has been left behind. Pregnant women and new mothers.

AAN Addresses Pregnant Women with a Substance Use Disorder

As the prescription opioid epidemic gained momentum, many hospitals began seeing an uptick in Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome (NAS). The condition affects newborns who were exposed to opioids in utero. Once born, babies experience the symptoms that an addict withdrawing from opioids faces. Extended hospital stays and close monitoring is required to mitigate the risk of the infant experiencing further complications.

In a fair number of states, using drugs during pregnancy is grounds for child abuse charges. In Alabama, Kentucky, Ohio, Tennessee, and Wisconsin, mothers found to be exposing their unborn or newborn children to drugs face the threat of arrest. Just as with the war on drugs, punitive actions have the unintended effect of causing people to hide their problems. In the case of pregnant women, this can mean disastrous consequences for the child.

The American Academy of Nursing (Academy) released a policy brief calling for an end to criminal prosecution and punitive civil actions for pregnant and new mothers. The organization, 2,700-members strong, calls for a public health response rather than disciplinary actions. They contend that laws in the above states cause women to live in fear, which prevents them from accessing essential health services. The AAN writes:

“At the forefront of the national stage for the past several years, the opioid epidemic has expanded the public’s awareness of substance use disorders (SUDs) and treatments during this public health emergency. For pregnant women with SUDs however, punitive actions in place of a public health response have resulted in criminal charges, arrests, and incarceration for these women. This has reinforced a culture of fear and barriers to essential health services. Early entry into maternity care plays a vital role in long-term health and social outcomes. Recovery-oriented public health responses are urgently needed to shift the culture of punishment to one of enduring therapeutic intent for women as well as their infants, children, and families affected by SUDs.” 

Included in the policy brief are several suggestions to assist doctors and state and federal agencies, such as increasing:

• Federal funding for SAMHSA State Targeted Response to the Opioid Crisis grants (Opioid STR) and Opioid STR Supplement grants that include SUD services for pregnant and parenting women and that develop community-based partnerships to ensure safe access to health services including prevention, treatment, and recovery supports for women, their children, and families.
• State funding to ensure accessible community-based treatment, recovery supports, and health and social services for women, their children, and families affected by substance use regardless of immigration status or ability to pay for services.

 

Substance Use Disorder Treatment

At Celebrate Hope, we can help you or your loved one overcome and recover from substance use disorder. Please contact our team today to learn more about our faith-based addiction treatment program. With cutting-edge treatment and Christian counseling, you can start celebrating hope today.

Alcohol Use Disorder Medications

Alcohol use disorder may not steal as many headlines as opioid use disorder, but the condition is even more deadly. To be clear, any form of addiction requires treatment and a program of recovery; and, in a perfect world, all types of mental illness would receive the attention they deserve. With that in mind, there exists a dire need to develop methods for helping alcoholics abstain from alcohol. While treatment works, and recovery is possible, the risk of relapse is expressly high for multiple reasons; a primary factor being that alcohol is exponentially more pervasive than other addictive substances.

A heroin addict who finds recovery has a pretty good shot at never coming into contact with the substance again provided however that they stay out of environments where the drug is used. Given the legal standing of heroin, it is unlikely in most cases a person will attend a family gathering and see people using the drug; the same cannot be said for alcohol, and whenever a person is close to the substance, cravings are likely to develop. In early recovery, cravings are too much for some people to contend with and a decision might be made to use again.

Beer, wine, and liquor are everywhere! It is challenging to go anywhere, be it a grocery store or a sporting event, and not run into the substance. Unless someone's program is particularly strong, exposure can trigger cravings and cravings can trigger a relapse. While there are a few medications that individuals can turn to, to keep urges at bay or cause sickness if one drinks, none of the available medicines are ideal. Since abstinence is the goal and relapse rates are notably high, researchers are working tirelessly to find a means of keeping cravings for alcohol to a minimum.

Alcohol Use Disorder Medication

Each year, some 88,000 Americans die of alcohol-related causes, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC); alcohol's death toll significantly surpasses that of opioids. A professor from the University of Rhode Island College of Pharmacy is working to find a medication that can help people recover from alcohol abuse, according to a URI press release. With the help of a $1.65 million federal grant, Professor Fatemeh Akhlaghi, the Ernest Mario Distinguished Chair in Pharmaceutics, is testing a Pfizer drug initially developed to treat obesity and diabetes.

The research centers on a drug that targets ghrelin, a peptide that stimulates appetite and food intake, the article reports. Individuals with higher concentrations of ghrelin are found to have more significant cravings and consume more alcohol. A preliminary study, appearing in the journal Molecular Psychiatry, involving 12 patients using a ghrelin-blocking drug to help curb cravings for alcohol shows excellent promise. A larger placebo-controlled clinical trial is underway to determine the drug's efficacy.

"The drugs that are available to treat alcohol use disorder either came from opioids or other drugs that make you have an aversive effect if you drink, and each of them has only small effects," Akhlaghi said. "The study with the 12 patients shows potential success, although the results are clearly very preliminary and in need for replication. In the new phase, we are looking at the efficacy of the drug. We cannot say this is a cure; we can say it is a promising therapy."

Alcohol Use Disorder Treatment

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Enough Fentanyl to Kill 26 Million People

Opioid use disorder is a treatable mental illness; those who undergo treatment and commit themselves to working a program of recovery can lead productive lives. While useful forms of treatment are available, many find it difficult to seek help due to the intense cravings typical of opioid addiction. Everything that public health officials can do, must be done, to encourage as many people as possible to seek addiction treatment—the risk of overdose death is notoriously high.

Many of you are probably aware that the likelihood of fentanyl exposure among heroin addicts is exceedingly high. With each year that passes, more and more people succumb to fentanyl exposure, an analgesic that is 100 times more potent than morphine and 50-80 times stronger than average batches of heroin. When people cut heroin with fentanyl, the result is a deadly cocktail. In fact, research shows that fentanyl-related deaths more than tripled between 2010 and 2016.

One of the reasons fentanyl is more prevalent than ever is because cartels in Mexico can synthesize the drug with ease. Drug cartels acquire the necessary precursors from Asia and then chemists south of the border manufacture the hazardous substance. Once in powder form, the drugs is either stamped into pills disguised as highly coveted OxyContin or cut into batches of heroin to boost potency. In either case, opioid users on this side of the border have no way of knowing that the drug they are about to ingest, smoke, snort, or inject contains the presence of fentanyl.

Fentanyl is Everywhere

So just how likely is it that people will come in contact with fentanyl? Highly likely! The drug made the headline once again after a Nebraska State Trooper pulled over a truck hauling 118 pounds of the deadly substance, CNN reports. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) states that 2 milligrams of fentanyl is a lethal dose; a little math shows that there was enough fentanyl confiscated to kill roughly 26 million people.

"This year is going to be a banner year, a record year in a bad way, in overdose deaths in the United States," said Matthew Barden, an associate special agent with the ‎DEA.

Naloxone is a drug that can reverse the deadly symptoms of an overdose; unfortunately, fentanyl is so potent that it often doesn’t work and people die. When a fentanyl overdose is reversed, first responders often have to give victims multiple doses of the drug. Pharmacies sell naloxone under the name Narcan. Fentanyl is only going to be more prevalent in the coming years. Anyone caught in the destructive cycle of opioid use disorder should seek help immediately and begin working a program of addiction recovery.

 

Southern California Opioid Use Disorder Treatment

Celebrate Hope at Hope By The Sea can assist anyone struggling with an opioid use disorder. We can help you end the cycle of addiction, please contact us today.

Opioid Overdose Deaths Among Latinos

"I'm a serious addict," Julio Cesar Santiago (44), tells NPR. "I still have dreams where I'm about to use drugs, and I have to wake up and get on my knees and pray, 'let God take this away from me,' because I don't want to go back. I know that if I go back out there, I'm done."

The above quote is likely to resonate with anyone who lives with alcohol or substance use disorder and finds addiction recovery. In early recovery, most people kneel and pray regularly throughout the day; the gravitational pull of drugs and alcohol is a force to be reckoned with requiring eternal vigilance to prevent relapse. While all mind-altering substances carry inherent risks of injury and premature death, one could argue that opioids exist in a separate class with exponentially higher stakes.

The American opioid addiction epidemic remains as one of the chief public health concerns. Many of you are aware that roughly a hundred people perish from an overdose each day usually stemming from prescription opioids, heroin, or fentanyl (a synthetic opioid approximately a hundred times stronger than morphine). Almost 3 million American battle opioid use disorder, an estimate that some experts feel is probably conservative. One of the ways researchers develop stats on how many people are struggling with a condition is by the number of individuals that receive treatment. Given that the vast majority of people living with addiction never access care, it is hard to develop an accurate picture of the problem. Even still, we can confidently assert that more than 2 million people are bound to OUD in this country.

Opioid Use Disorder, Overdose, and Latinos

Most of the news about the epidemic focuses on the disproportionate number of non-Hispanic whites suffering from opioid use disorder and dying of an overdose. As a result, the media and many experts overlook specific demographics struggling with opioids, especially Latinos. In fact, research shows that opioid overdose deaths among Latinos is on the rise nationwide, and in Massachusetts, ODs are increasing at twice the rate of whites and blacks, according to NPR. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention(CDC) reports that Latino overdose deaths rose 52.5 percent between 2014 and 2016, as compared to 45.8 percent for whites.

"What we thought initially, that this was a problem among non-Hispanic whites, is not quite accurate," says Robert Anderson, mortality statistics branch chief at the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics. "If you go back into the data, you can see the increases over time in all of these groups, but we tended to focus on the non-Hispanic whites because the rates were so much higher."

It is challenging to extrapolate what's behind the surge in opioid overdose deaths among Blacks and Hispanics. After conducting scores of interviews with addicts, physicians, and treatment providers a more precise picture emerged; a lack of bilingual treatment options, cultural barriers, and possible deportation fears likely have a hand in the growing death toll. What’s more, NPR points out that the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) website is only available in English; however, they do offer a toll free number "for free and confidential information in English and Spanish for individuals and family members facing substance abuse and mental health issues." Mind you, that it's SAMHSA's responsibility to improve the quality and availability of treatment and rehabilitative services.

Opioid Use Disorder Treatment

If you are suffering from addiction and a co-occurring mental health disorder, please contact Celebrate Hope at Hope by The Sea. We can help you end the cycle of addiction and provide you with the tools and skills necessary for achieving lasting recovery.

Opioid Addiction Report: Declare A National Emergency

There is a good chance that you have been affected by the widespread misuse of opioid painkillers. Either yourself personally, or you have a loved one or close friend who's been touched by the disease of addiction. Right now, there are millions of Americans living with an untreated opioid use disorder. You may have heard tell that the White House appointed a Commission on Combating Drug Addiction and the Opioid Crisis. The hope is to find viable solutions to our nation’s most serious public health crisis.

Solutions are desperately needed, people are dying and many more are meeting the criteria for opioid addiction with each day that passes. Confronting this epidemic has proved to be a serious challenge. While there have been efforts to both assist addicts get help and make it harder to acquire prescription opioids, still around 142 Americans die of an overdose every day.

Last year, Congress approved and President Obama signed into law a couple piece of legislation aimed at putting an end to the epidemic. Legislation that called for funding addiction treatment services, expanding access to the opioid overdose reversal drug naloxone and training doctors to be more frugal prescribers. The Comprehensive Addiction and Recovery Act (CARA) and the 21st Century Cures Act have yet to bear quantifiable proof. Only time will tell. The current administration has placed their trust in the opioid commission to address the epidemic.

 

Opioid Crisis Report

Many addiction experts have eagerly awaited what conclusions the commission would make. This week, the Commission on Combating Drug Addiction and the Opioid Crisis released a preliminary report, according to the Associated Press. Wherein, the first order of business calls for the President to declare the opioid addiction epidemic a national emergency. Report says that roughly 142 deaths each day is "equal to September 11th event every three weeks."

“Your declaration would empower your cabinet to take bold steps and would force Congress to focus on funding and empowering the Executive Branch even further to deal with this loss of life. It would also awaken every American to this simple fact: if this scourge has not found you or your family yet, without bold action by everyone, it soon will.” 

The commission included several recommendations in their report, including:

• Enforcing mental health parity laws, ensuring people get the coverage they need for addiction treatment.
• Equipping “all” law enforcement officers with naloxone.
• Funding federal agencies to develop fentanyl detection sensors.
• Increasing the use of opioid addiction medications, such as buprenorphine.
• Require doctors and other people working in the medical field to get buprenorphine prescribing waivers.
• Facilitate state prescription drug monitoring programs data sharing nationally by July 1, 2018.

The commissioner stated that it will release another report later this fall.

 

Addiction Treatment

Opioid addiction is difficult to recover from, but it is possible. The process usually begins with detox to help you get through the withdrawal process, the pain of which often leads to immediate relapse without assistance. Then followed by residential addiction treatment to teach you how a life in recovery can be achieved, teaching you skills and providing tools to help achieve success. After treatment, a continued program of spiritual maintenance is how one holds on to their recovery for years to come.

If you are ready to take the journey of addiction recovery, please contact Celebrate Hope at Hope by The Sea today.

1 Million Heroin Users in America

Grim news was printed this week, courtesy of The New York Times. And, once again opioids are at the center of the discussion. Preliminary data compiled by the newspaper indicates that drug overdose deaths in America probably exceeded 59,000 last year. Unless something drastic is done soon, this is a trend that will likely continue in the coming years.

People are dying. Opioid use disorder, or opioid addiction is the root of the problem. Yet, in 2017, nearly twenty years into the 21st Century, millions of Americans still struggle to access addiction treatment services. Even when they want help. In rural America, the closest addiction treatment center is sometimes hundreds of miles away. Given that fact that many opioid addicts are at the lower end of the socioeconomic scale, the likelihood of traveling such distances for help is slim to none.

In addition to a lack of treatment options, many addicts still have hard time getting naloxone, the opioid overdose reversal drug that has saved thousands of American lives, and will continue to do so. But, getting the drug without a prescription is still not possible in certain places. Even if one can acquire it, affording the medicine is a whole different story. Perhaps you've heard the news about ever-increasing naloxone prices. Wherever you find demand, you find greed.

 

An Epidemic That Costs Billions

Prescription opioids are still a problem, to be sure. Yet, heroin use has steadily increased in recent years. What’s more, the mixing of heroin and fentanyl has become a common occurrence. Users who don’t know their heroin was mixed with the deadly painkiller are at great risk of overdose death. There are an estimated 1 million people actively using heroin in America today, according to a University of Illinois at Chicago press release. All told, heroin use in the United States costs society $51 billion in 2015. The costs are tied to:

• Addiction Treatment
• Heroin-related Crime
• Imprisonment
• Treating Chronic Infectious Diseases
• Treating Newborns with Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome (NAS)
• Overdose Deaths
• Lost Job Productivity

“The downstream effects of heroin use, such as the spread of infectious diseases and increased incarceration due to actions associated with heroin use, compounded by their associated costs, would continue to increase the societal burden of heroin use disorder,” said UIC pharmacoeconomists, Simon Pickard.

 

The Greatest Cost Is Life

Loss of productivity pales in comparison to the staggering death toll that could be reduced by increasing access to addiction treatment services. The longer one goes without treatment, the greater the chance of an overdose. If you are struggling with addiction to any form of opioids, please contact Celebrate Hope at Hope By The Sea today.

Our highly-trained staff specializes in the treatment of opioid use disorder. The opioid addiction epidemic is the most serious drug crisis the world has ever seen, and putting an end to it starts with treatment.

Cocaine, Heroin and Overdose

For an addict, there is such a thing as “more high.” Even if tolerance says otherwise. With some drugs, such as marijuana, a continued effort to increase one’s euphoria may not be that dangerous. But for drugs like prescription opioids or heroin, riding the line between intoxication and overdose is never in one's best interest—but highly sought after. What is considered to be a good high, can quickly turn into a deadly overdose.

The death toll related to drug abuse is almost always focused on opioid narcotics these days. While such drugs do not need any help with regard to being dangerous, addicts will commonly mix opioids with other narcotics, sometimes “uppers” and sometimes with more “downers.” It is quite common for people who mix opioids with benzodiazepines to experience a fatal overdose. However, there is another trend that has the power to take one’s life, commonly referred to as “speedballing.” That is mixing opioids and cocaine together, to be injected simultaneously. You may be aware that a number of celebrities have lost their life to the admixture, including:

• John Belushi
• Chris Farley
• Philip Seymour Hoffman

The general public almost never hears about cocaine anymore, being overshadowed by drugs like heroin and fentanyl. If you did hear about cocaine, it is likely that it was because somebody famous died using the drug recently. But make no mistake, cocaine abuse is still a very real problem affecting many Americans. And for those with an opioid use disorder, who are finding that their tolerance is making it difficult to experience euphoria, cocaine might be the solution they consider. Anyone who has ever done a speedball will tell you that there is no other high quite like it, or as dangerous.

While cocaine use rates have been down in recent years, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency's (DEA) 2016 National Drug Threat Assessment has shown a significant increase in cocaine-related overdose deaths in recent years, according to the U.S. News & World Report. Cocaine can be deadly on its own; but when mixed with opioids the drug becomes exponentially more fatal.

“When there are no opioids involved in cocaine-overdose deaths you see an overall decline in recent years,” says Christopher M. Jones, an acting associate deputy assistant secretary with the Department of Health and Human Services. “But when you look at cocaine and opioids together, we see a more than doubling in the number of overdoses since 2010, with heroin and synthetic opioids increasingly involved in these deaths."

The Pain of Opioid Withdrawal

It is easy to blame the American opioid epidemic on doctors, pharmaceutical companies and our over reliance on prescription drugs. While all of those played a huge role in the issue becoming a full blown national crisis, the fact remains that opioid narcotics are extremely difficult to stop using for many people—especially those who experience legitimate chronic pain. Those of you in recovery for an opioid use disorder, whether prescription painkillers or heroin, know all too well just how difficult it was to break the cycle of opioid addiction.

It often takes people suffering from opioid addiction a number of attempts at abstinence to finally succeed. And those who do manage to find recovery from such drugs typically need assistance via medical detox, inpatient treatment and regular attendance at 12-Step recovery meetings.

Those who have known alcoholics who managed to sober up using Alcoholics Anonymous, may find themselves asking why opioid addicts are unable to do the same? The answer to that question usually lies in the nature of opioid withdrawal. The early days of abstinence from opioids is by all accounts an extremely painful, uncomfortable experience. Typically characterized by:

• Anxiety
• Depression
• Diarrhea
• Cramping
• Insomnia
• Irritability
• Nausea
• Pain
• Restlessness

While it is true that opioid withdrawal is painful, those who actually have a chronic pain condition which led to the use of opioids in the first place, are met with even more pain as the drugs leave their system. What’s more, it can take some time for the brain to start producing painkilling endorphins after being idle for extended periods of time. Those who cannot tolerate the pain experienced during that interim period are at great risk of relapse, HealthDay reports. Kelly Dunn, an addiction specialist who researches opioids at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, in Baltimore, points out that:

"When you stop taking opioids it takes time for your body to regenerate its own 'painkiller' system," she explained. "Generally, four to five days. The severity varies per patient, and it's not predictable who will react how -- but withdrawal is real." 

It for the reasons mentioned above that many prescription opioid addicts require inpatient treatment. Being in a monitored environment, closed off from the medicine cabinet at home and aided by addiction withdrawal medicines are vital to the success of recovery.