Opioid Addiction Is a Real Medical Problem and Condition. We can’t ignore the effects of addiction across the US. It is a chronic medical condition affecting millions of families each year. The use of opioid’s to treat many medical conditions affects how the brain thinks. It also affects how the body reacts to pain addiction. The brain will trick your body into thinking that it needs the drug in order to function daily. What this then causes is the brain to develop a compulsive drug addiction behavior problem. The National Institute on Drug Abuse has defined this as a dependence on the opioid addiction for painkillers which then develops a heroin addiction. This problem then leads to a long-term brain disease which leads to long-term dependence on opioids. The dependence can be treated by long-term medication-assisted treatments along with counseling and support for the medical addiction and this can be done through places like Options Treatment Center.
Long-term goals
The long-term goal is to help patients to stop misusing the drug. It is to help them to regain control of their life and to continue on their long-term treatment plan. New patients that receive long-term treatment options can expect to take a numerous medications.
Treatment options
One treatment option is the use of methadone. It is widely used for treatment throughout the country. Another treatment option is suboxone. The new use of suboxone has become the leading transitional drug for patients suffering from opioid addiction.
National statistics
One of the leading killers in the United States is a drug overdose. The number of deaths in the United States for 2014 was 47,000 deaths. The number of people who suffered from overdoses in 2014 that were related to death was over 18,000 people. This number was related to prescription painkillers and over 10,000 people died from the use of heroin during 2014.
What most people do not realize is that 4 out of the 5 people who have a heroin addiction have first started out on prescription opioids. Since the start of heroin overdoses started being recorded in 2000, the number of deaths caused by heroin has quadrupled between 2000 and 2013. It was during the time period that the increase has led to more research being formed on opioid addictions.
Treatment centers
Treatment centers are ideal for patients who have been unable to stop abusing drugs. What patients do not realize is that the stopping of opioids can be deadly if not done properly. The use of opioids and then stopping them can lead to deadly withdrawal because of the heart and how the drugs can cause stress on the heart.
Family support
Families want their loved ones to stop misusing the drugs but this is something that takes time and patience. The long-term goal is to live free of drug addiction, no matter the type of drugs. You want to help the family and the patient but the problem is that if the patient is not wanting to come off from the drugs or to stop using them, the patient is not able to stop. They have to want to stop abusing before it can be done.
Opioids are a gateway to other drugs
That is why there are so many people suffering from drug addiction and why they turn to other drugs when they no longer feel the high from the opioids. The patient will start to receive fewer prescription drugs over time when the doctor starts to notice the patient has developed a drug addiction. When this happens, they will turn to other drugs like heroin in order to get the high that they crave.
Once an addict learns how to cope and deal with the withdrawal of the drugs, he or sge can also learn techniques to cope with pain. The key is to help him or her control the feeling of needing the drugs that the body craves. The brain will have to be taught how to live without the painkillers and without the other drugs that the addict has started misusing because of the addiction to the painkillers.
Infographic Source: http://www.TurnToHelp.com