Drug Rehab

There has been a vast amount of research conducted on the various aspects of Drug Rehab and much of these clinical studies have concluded in clearly demonstrating that the effective treatment of heroin and other forms of severe addiction to narcotics has a very positive cost benefit analysis when the overall economic considerations on the national scale are factored in.

Various studies on the economic impact of opiate addiction in the United States have estimated the overall costs to society of an untreated heroin user out in public was over $90,000 in various criminal offenses and emergency interventions. Furthermore, the overall cost of maintaining that same individual in a corrective institution was over $80,000 and the cost of maintaining that person in a drug-free program was over $30,000. Compared to these significant costs, the expenditures involved in one year of methadone maintenance Drug Rehab treatment was a much smaller sum: $6,000.

A significant number of medications have been utilized to treat individuals dependent on a variety of narcotics other than alcohol, but unfortunately there has not been a suitable number of controlled trials concluded to date. A considerable amount of research is currently underway in a number of clinical institutions all over the world. This research is directly focused in measuring and quantifying the efficacy of various medications which are commonly utilized in various forms of Drug Rehab to treat addiction to heroin.

One of these medications is buprenorphine, which is a partial opiate agonist with effects on the human body which act to reduce the craving for heroin. In order to minimize the potential for the abuse of this drug, the opiate antagonist naloxone is being administered alongside buprenorphine in tablet form. Buprenorphine has not been universally approved for use in a clinical Drug Rehab environment, and several major countries prohibit its use.

There are several medications that are currently being analyzed for their efficacy in reducing the craving for cocaine. Furthermore, a sequence of clinical trials are under way to develop a chemical compound which synthesizes the basic chemical structure of cocaine itself and could be utilized to immunize individuals against cocaine. There is a reasonable body of evidence to suggest that the antidepressant bupropion may also be implemented in a comprehensive therapeutic strategy since it has been proven to minimize cocaine use in patients who are moderately depressed and are habitual users of cocaine and crack.

There currently exist a wide range of various medications which are sometimes utilized in the Drug Rehab treatment of heroin addiction. These compounds include:

- Clonidine for the treatment of the symptoms of withdrawal
- Naltrexone which has the function of blocking the effects of various opiates
- LAAM (l-alpha- acetylmethadol) which acts as an opiate substitute
- Codeine which is a common medication generally used as an analgesic

These medications are utilized rather infrequently by Drug Rehab professionals and LAAM is not approved for use in many major nations.

This situation is not widely publicized as it is rather rare in the United Kingdom at this time, but heroin has been utilized as a medication to help maintain some addicts in various Drug Rehabs in the United Kingdom. The British researchers have accumulated a considerable body of evidence to prove that there is some level of beneficial short-term effects. Some individuals who have undergone this form of Drug Rehab treatment been successfully maintained on prescribed heroin for a number of years. An ongoing clinical trial in Switzerland has demonstrated that the administration of heroin directly intended for intravenous use, or a prescribed utilization for intravenous methadone, has been linked with a considerable amelioration in the health and lifestyle of narcotics patients who have been seriously dependent and socially marginalized, and there have been reports that some of these positive outcomes have been maintained over several years.

An opiate-like, synthetic, long-acting medication that has been widely utilized by Drug Rehab professionals either to maintain patients being withdrawn from heroin use or as a treatment maintenance medication is Methadone, a drug which has the unique qualities to act as a substitute for various opiates and thus acts in preventing the beginning of the symptoms of withdrawal thereby blocking the main psychological effects of heroin. Another advantage to the medication is that Methadone is administered orally thus eliminating the risks of injection.

Methadone has been proven to limit illicit opiate consumption and therefore has a direct positive effect on criminal activity, improving the individual's productivity and general social health, reduces the transmission of HIV and other virological agents, and improves the overall physical health of the individual, as well as ameliorating the outcomes of pregnancy outcomes for female addicts. There is a considerable body of clinical research which has been performed on methadone maintenance treatment in a Drug Rehab setting and the general conclusion is that if methadone is implemented in adequate doses and alongside supportive therapy, it is a medication that has an acceptable record for safety under longer-term use and its overall outcomes are linked with retention of the patient in Drug Rehab treatment in a fairly positive manner.

Methadone dosage has been the subject of frequent debate, and the prevailing opinion is that the individual doses must be custom tailored to the specific and particular requirements of the patient. It should be noted that patients who are maintained on higher doses in the neighborhood of approximately 80 mg. during their Drug Rehab have better overall long term results than those individuals who are maintained on lower doses.

It is obvious by analyzing the research that there is a clear and specific role for various pharmacotherapies. It is important that they be implemented in settings which are strictly controlled as an additive to the various other Drug Rehab treatment strategies. It is especially important to exercise extreme caution and implement careful monitoring on a regular basis for patients who are undergoing courses of treatment featuring medications which have a potential to become addictive on their own.