2014’s top posts: # 9

~ Jason Schwartz

Gabapentin high

neurontinDJ Mac recently posted about something I’d never heard of, gabapentin misuse. Sure enough, when I type gabapentin into google, one of the first suggested searches is “gabapentin high”.

There are reports of these drugs being used to maximise the effects of methadone and being misused by heroin users. In Scotland, a BJGP paper from 2012 reported:

Unfortunately, our clinical experience suggests that gabapentin is now prevalent as a drug of abuse…In primary care, an increasing number and urgency of prescription requests cannot necessarily be explained by the increased number of cases of neuropathic pain. In the substance misuse service, the numbers admitting to using gabapentin (local street name: ‘gabbies’, approx £1 per 300 mg) are also growing.

Published by Jason Schwartz

I have been an addiction professional and social worker since 1994. I started blogging in 2005 as the Clinical Director at Dawn Farm. I no longer work at Dawn Farm and am now the Director of Behavioral Medicine at a community hospital, and a lecturer at Eastern Michigan University’s School of Social Work. Views expressed here are my own. Keep in mind that the field, the contexts in which the field operates, and my views have changed over time.