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- How Can Perscription Drugs Become Addictive?
- What is Prescription Drug Addiction?
- Prescription Drug Withdrawal
- Pain Management & Detox
- Counter Conditioning Treatment
- Schick Shadel Prescription Drug Treatment
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How Can a Prescription Drug Become Addictive?
Addictive prescription drugs such as OxyContin, Percocet and Vicodin, produce an artificial feeling of pleasure. If pain killing prescription drug use is stopped when no longer needed for real pain, there is less chance of the prescription drug becoming addictive to that user. This is possibly due to the non-abusing patients’ pain levels reducing some of the opioid euphoric effects. Such drugs short-circuit your survival system by artificially stimulating the pleasure areas in your brain. As this happens, it leads to increased confidence in the drug and less confidence in normal body feelings and the rewards of life. This first happens on a physical level, then like other addictive drugs, it has a psychological effect. Interest in other aspects of life decreases as reliance on the drug increases. People, places and activities involved with using these drugs become increasingly important. Conversely, lifestyles that worked through your normal reward system before using the drug begin to diminish. After awhile, a heavy prescriptive drug user, like the illicit drug user, will actually resent people, places, and activities that do not fit in with that drug use.
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What is Prescription Drug Addiction?
A prescription drug addiction occurs when an individual becomes dependent on opiates, sedatives, stimulants or other classes of drugs that are prescribed by a physician. It is possible to abuse many of these prescribed medications if they are taken with a frequency or in a manner that are not prescribed by a doctor.
Someone who is addicted to a prescription drug has developed a need or habit for that medication.
Signs of Prescription Drug Abuse
Prescription drug addiction can affect the young, middle-aged or elderly. Prescription drug addicted individuals may come from any walk of life, hold entry-level or high positions. They may be parents, grandparents, single or married. Often, the addiction develops without the user realizing it until the drug begins to control his or her life. Drug dependency warning signs include an individual exceeding the dosage prescribed or seeking to obtain the drug after the time prescribed by their physician.
What is Drug Craving?
Prescription drug craving is the result of the drug imprinting in the memory a pleasant association of euphoria with the drug. The subconscious memory motivates the individual to seek this drug because of the false imprint. The brain, in effect, has been trained that using the drug is the fastest way to feel good. This learning process produces a new appetite or drive to seek the drug, called craving. Drug craving is most often activated by a memory of pleasure. These memories could include a habit of using the drug when feeling bad to rapidly feel good, or a situation with people, places and activities in where a previous habit / pattern of drug use has been established. |
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Can There be Withdrawal from Prescription Drugs?
Yes. The symptoms, the severity and length of the withdrawal depend on the particular medication and the amount of it taken. Based on their experience treating withdrawal symptoms, our medical staff will administer medications to make the withdrawal as comfortable as possible.
Treatment for this “pain pills” addiction includes working out pain issues with the patient’s pain clinic or physician.
Prescription Drug Classifications
Opiate Drugs or “Narcotics”
• Oxycodone (OxyContin, Percodan, Percocet, Tylox)
• Hydrocodone (Lortab, Lorcet, Vicodin, aka Vicodan)
• Meperidine (Demerol, Mepergan)
Stimulant Drugs or “Uppers“
• Methylphenidate (Ritalin)
• Amphetamine (Dexedrine, Adderall)
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Pain Management and Detox
Pain management is necessary for people suffering from injuries and chronic pain. Effective pain management often requires powerful pain killers. For people in pain, addiction to opiate pain medications is a real risk. Pain management drugs such as OxyContin, Percocet, Percodan, OxyCodone, Morphine, Codeine and Vicodin are called opiates. Persons taking prescription opiate/opioid (narcotic pain) medications may become physiologically dependent and/or addicted. These are powerful medications that can cause strong cravings which make it very difficult to discontinue comfortably and safely without medical treatment, especially if a person still suffers from the pain the drugs are intended to ease.
Schick Shadel Hospital offers safe and comfortable medical detoxification from these medications, as well as rehabilitation and treatment to promote future abstinence. Opioid substitution, for example methadone and buprenorphine/naloxone (Suboxone) are NOT used at Schick Shadel Hospital. We will detoxify and/or treat persons who are using prescription opiates/opioids orally, intranasally (snorting) or by inhalation (smoking). Schick Shadel Hospital does not detoxify nor treat persons who are primarily intravenous users of prescription opiates/opioids or heroin.
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Fast and Effective Therapy
Counter Conditioning works fast and it works effectively. Our patients can begin recovery without that immediate craving to drink or use. The doctors and nurses providing the aversion treatment, monitor the level of aversion continuously through treatment and in the follow-up sessions.
About 20 percent of addicts have at least two problems: the biochemical problem of addiction, and a psychiatric problem. This is about the same percentage of psychiatric problems seen in non-users. Both problems need to be treated to achieve success, but all too often only the psychiatric problem receives attention. Many have died of their addictions while futilely trying to find out “why they drink” or “why they use.“
A thorough detoxification followed by a comprehensive bio-psycho-social assessment and ‘differential diagnosis’ can ascertain what issues exist so that all the issues can be addressed. Mental illness and chemical dependency are both illnesses of the brain.
Counter conditioning treatment at Schick Shadel is provided to individuals addicted to alcohol, marijuana, opiates (oxy, oxycodone, OxyContin, including other prescription pain killers), Vicodin and crystal methamphetamine (crystal meth or other amphetamines). Read more about Schick Shadel's Counter Conditioning Program »
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Drug Treatment Programs
Schick Shadel drug treatment programs offer medical care in an atmosphere of understanding and acceptance. We know that drug addiction is in part a neurological disease - not a failure of willpower. The Schick Shadel drug treatment is a non-12 step program that addresses the medical causes of drug addiction resulting in the elimination or mitigation of drug hunger.
Physicians are specialist in addiction medicine, certified by the American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM) and/or the American Board of Medical Specialties (ABMS). Caring nurses and national Certified Addiciton Therapists are also on staff. Our drug treatment programs recognize that addiction is an illness that can benefit from medical as well as other modalities of treatment. Schick Shadel drug treatment offers medical treatment and psychological counseling to simultaneously address many of the inputs to drug addiction. After medical detoxification, if indicated, drug treatment patients will complete an initial 10 day inpatient treatment program followed by two to four, two day inpatient follow-ups. These are generally at 30 and 90 days post-discharge. Read more about Schick Shadel's Prescription Drug Treatment Program »
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