In this article, I examine children's reported experiences with stimulant drug treatments for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in light of bioethical arguments about the potential threats of psychotropic drugs to authenticity and moral agency. Drawing on a study that involved over 150 families in the USA and the UK, I show that children are able to report threats to authenticity, but th...

OBJECTIVE This study estimated prevalences and correlates of stimulant diversion in the United States and examined relationships between diversion and measures of abuse or dependence. METHODS We conducted descriptive and multivariate analysis of data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health. Key measures were nonmedical use (misuse) of any prescription stimulant, any stimulant other th...

BACKGROUND Previous studies document neuropsychological deficits associated with stimulant abuse, but findings are inconsistent. METHODS We identified 50 twin pairs in which only 1 member had heavy stimulant abuse (cocaine and/or amphetamines) ending at least 1 year before the evaluation. The co-twin control research design controls for familial vulnerability and makes it easier to identify n...

Use of illicit stimulants such as methamphetamine, cocaine, and ecstasy is an increasing health problem. Chronic use can cause neurotoxicity in animals and humans but the long-term consequences are not well understood. The aim of the current study was to investigate the long-term effect of stimulant use on the morphology of the human substantia nigra. We hypothesised that history of illicit sti...

Polysaccharide immunomodulators were first discovered over 40 years ago. Although very few have been rigorously studied, recent reports have revealed the mechanism of action and structure-function attributes of some of these molecules. Certain polysaccharide immunomodulators have been identified that have profound effects in the regulation of immune responses during the progression of infectiou...