بررسی اثرات مصرف مواد اعتیادآور، بر کارکردهای عصب- روانشناختی معتادان شهر شیراز

Background and Aim: Today, one of the mostly used medicines to treat opioid abuse is methadone maintenance treatment. Some studies have reported that this treatment has cognitive side-effects. But, it is important to study the extent of the negative effects of methadone, compared to opium and Norjizak in normal individuals. The reason why there two narcotic drugs were chosen was the high prevalence of taking them in the community in terms of their unknown neuropsychological effects. Materials and Methods: The present research was a descriptive - analytical investigation. The sample of the study consisted of 119 men (32 methadone, 30 norjizak, 27 opium abusers and 30 individuals as the control group) who were all selected through access method. Tools used for data collection were: Rey’s auditory verbal learning test, Trail making test,and Stroop colors-word test. The obtained data was analysed by means of SPSS software (V:13) using one-way variance analysis and Tukey at the significant level α=0.05. Results: Our study showed that there was a significant difference between the groups in short term memory (F=2.87, P=0.01), learning ability (F=5.09, P=0.002), delayed memory (F=4.26, P=0.007), and trial making test (F=3.68, P=0.01).The test following revealed that Norjizak -dependent subjects performed significantly worse than others with respect to short-term memory (P=0.03), learning ability (P=0.003), recognition (P=0.01) , and trial making tests (P=0.02). Conclusion: The current study confirmed that opium and Norjizak abusing had destructive effects mainly in the functions of specific brain regions supporting memory, learning, and executive functions. However, methadone can minimize these negative effects.