BACKGROUND Negative emotional states and abnormal stress reactivity are central components in drug addiction. The brain stress system in the amygdala is thought to play a key role in the maintenance of drug dependence through negative reinforcement. Although acute heroin administration was found to reduce anxiety, craving, and stress hormone release, whether these effects are reflected in amygd...

This paper reviews the literature regarding the development of children up to age 6 years who were born to mothers addicted to heroin or methadone. These children are compared with children born to nonaddicted mothers to determine whether there were any differences between the two groups related to maternal drug addiction. This paper discusses the obstetrical and medical complications associate...

BACKGROUND Personality traits such as novelty seeking (NS) are associated with substance dependence but the mechanism underlying this association remains uncertain. Previous studies have focused on the role of the dopamine pathway. OBJECTIVE Examine the relationships between allelic variants of the catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT) gene, NS personality traits, and age of onset of drug use i...

Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the OPRM1 gene have been associated with vulnerability to opioid dependence. The current study identifies an association of an intronic SNP (rs9479757) with the severity of heroin addiction among Han-Chinese male heroin addicts. Individual SNP analysis and haplotype-based analysis with additional SNPs in the OPRM1 locus showed that mild heroin addiction...

To identify subtypes among individuals undergoing treatment for cocaine dependence, we evaluated 115 people with regard to sociodemographic, drug-related and psychopathological characteristics. Ten variables were preselected as the basis for a two-step cluster analysis with the aim of identifying subtypes. Two subtypes were identified (Type A, N = 37, and Type B, N = 78 subjects). The variable ...

new to the field of perinatal drug dependence by including transcriptions of the discussions that followed each paper's presentation. The discussions bring to light the marked disagreements between different groups of investigators over such major issues as heroin's effect on chromosomal aberrations, the drugs to be used for treating drug dependent neonates and the incidence of physical abuse o...

BACKGROUND Heroin addiction is a major public health problem affecting both the addicted individuals and their children, who have been shown to have poor social, educational and health status and to be at higher risk of abuse than their peers. Whilst the antenatal effects of parental drug use and the overall poor outcomes for these children have been widely studied, there has been little emphas...

BACKGROUND Charge-free heroin use disorder treatment in Italy follows two main approaches, i.e., harm reduction treatment (HRT) strategy in community low-threshold facilities for drug addiction and opioid agonist treatment (OAT) in high-threshold facilities for opioid addiction, focusing on pharmacological maintenance according to the Dole and Nyswander strategy. We aimed to compare the impact ...

Author information Paula Parsonage, Director, Health & Safety Developments, Auckland Lealofi Siō, Project Manager Pacific Mental Health & Addictions, Counties Manukau District Health Board Ti’a Kirkpatrick Mariner, Programme Manager, Pacific Health Division/Mental Health & Addictions, Counties Manukau District Health Board Natalie Leger, Project Manager Pacific Mental Health & Addictions, Count...

PURPOSE Drug treatment can be effective in community-based settings, but drug users tend to underuse these treatment options and instead seek services in emergency departments (EDs) and other acute care settings. The goals of this study were to describe prevalence and correlates of drug-related ED visits. BASIC PROCEDURES This study used data from the National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol ...