Neurobiological investigation of heroin revealed that abusers of this highly addictive substance show dysregulation in brain circuits for reward processing and cognitive control. Psychologically, personality traits related to reward processing and cognitive control differed between heroin abusers and non-abusers. Yet, there is no direct evidence on the relationship between these neurobiological...

Data indicate that substance abuse problems are common in the elderly but are largely ignored. The elderly cohort of abusers is divided into early and late onset groups. Abuse moderating factors include cohort effects, socioeconomic status, and frail health, while exacerbating factors include discretionary income, status as a hidden population, and caregiver complicity. Physiological and psycho...

Schizophrenia is a complex psychiatric disorder strongly associated with substance use disorders. Theoretically, schizophrenia and SUD may share endocannabinoid alterations in the brain reward system. The main endocannabinoids, anandamide, and 2-arachidonoylglycerol, are lipids which bind cannabinoid receptors. Oleoylethanolamide (OEA), a fatty-acid ethanolamide, binds peroxisome proliferator-a...

BACKGROUND A high prevalence of lifetime psychiatric disorders among help-seeking substance abusers has been clearly established. However, the long-term course of psychiatric disorders and mental distress among help-seeking substance abusers is still unclear. The aim of this research was to examine the course of mental distress using a six-year follow-up study of treatment-seeking substance-dep...

Mixed findings have been made with regard to the long-term predictive validity of antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) on criminal behaviour in samples of substance abusers. A longitudinal record-linkage study of a cohort of 1052 drug abusers admitted 1977-1995 was undertaken. Subjects were recruited from a detoxification and short-term rehabilitation unit in Lund, Sweden, and followed throug...

The anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) and lateral prefrontal (LPFC) cortex are brain regions important to executive cognitive functions (ECF). We determined ACC and LPFC function in 23-day abstinent cocaine abusers using positron emission tomography (PET H(2)(15)O) during performance of a modified version of the Stroop Task. Cocaine abusers showed less activation than non-drug-using comparison su...

PURPOSE Quality of life (QOL) has become an important endpoint in clinical trials and studies of medical interventions for many chronic diseases, but has not been widely studied in the substance abuse field. The purpose of this study was to measure QOL in a large sample of adult substance abusers (SA), to compare QOL ratings with those for other chronic diseases, and to assess factors influenci...

The use of tobacco by physicians with substance abuse histories is drastically understudied. A chart review of 1319 physicians enrolled in a physician health program found tobacco use highest for those referred for substance abuse problems (58.1%). Among a subset of currently monitored substance abusers, all those who relapsed during monitoring were using tobacco and had more difficulty maintai...