I was asked by a friend to comment on this article. Here's the response I sent him: Well, he's got a point. But he's also gotten a lot wrong, including the name of the NIAAA. It's National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcohol-ism. What he's right about is that not everyone who has an alcohol … Continue reading “No” to rehab?
Category: Research
Prescription drug overdose statistics visually
Popular Science has a chart with US overdose deaths by drug: ...the rate of reported overdoses the U.S. more than doubled between 1999 and 2010. About half of those additional deaths are in the pharmaceuticals category, which the CDC has written about before. Nearly three-quarters of the pharmaceuticals deaths are opioid analgesics—prescription painkillers like OxyContin and … Continue reading Prescription drug overdose statistics visually
Ten Percent in Recovery – NOT
Here's the headline at Partnership for a Drug-Free America: Survey: Ten Percent of American Adults Report Being in Recovery from Substance Abuse or Addiction Very interesting news, right? How did they arrive at that number? With a poll that asks, "Did you once have a problem with drugs or alcohol, but no longer do?" Does that measure … Continue reading Ten Percent in Recovery – NOT
24 month outcomes
Another study supports the effects of twelve step participation over 24 months. (I know the abstract says "self help", but the pay-walled article makes it clear that they were looking at twelve step participation.) Abstract The goal was to identify factors that predicted sustained cocaine abstinence and transitions from cocaine use to abstinence over … Continue reading 24 month outcomes
Seeking Safety + 12 Step Facilitation = good outcomes
The Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment looks at Seeking Safety plus twelve step facilitation. Good news: Objective The Recovery Management paradigm provides a conceptual framework for the examination of joint impact of a focal treatment and post-treatment service utilization on substance abuse treatment outcomes. We test this framework by examining the interactive effects of a treatment for … Continue reading Seeking Safety + 12 Step Facilitation = good outcomes
The placebo “problem”
It seems that PHARMA's difficulty in developing drugs with stronger effects than placebo has prompted a creative response to the researching drugs. Kas Thomas at assertTrue(), directs us to a scholarly journal article tackling the "problem": But then Fava and his coauthors make the baffling statement: "Thus far, there has been no attempt to develop … Continue reading The placebo “problem”
The “decline effect” hits naltrexone
The "decline effect" hits naltrexone. Background Oral naltrexone is an FDA-approved medication for treating alcohol use disorders. Although its efficacy has been supported in multiple clinical trials, an earlier review found that its effect sizes (ESs) on relapse to heavy drinking and, to a lesser extent, percent days drinking were smaller in more recent trials … Continue reading The “decline effect” hits naltrexone
The benefits of harm reduction are not as obvious as they seem
Theodore Dalrymple points out the inconsistency in the British Medical Journal's vigorous advocacy for harm reduction where heroin is concerned and its squeamishness with harm reduction for nicotine. He pulls a passage from BMJ and inserts comments: What, then, does the BMJ, so much in favour of harm reduction for heroin addicts, say about harm reduction … Continue reading The benefits of harm reduction are not as obvious as they seem
Dead addicts don’t recover, but…
This has gotten a lot of press. There's naloxone distribution doubt this will reduce overdose deaths. However, some pretty important questions remain: What happens after the overdose? What services/interventions might have prevented the overdose in the first place? The article references placing defibrillators in public places. What happens after someone is saved by one of those defibrillators? … Continue reading Dead addicts don’t recover, but…
What what?
A new study looking at the comparative effectiveness of various coping skills for dealing with urges to drink in preventing relapse reports some counter-intuitive findings [emphasis mine]: ...relying on going to a meeting or talking to a sponsor or counselor when experiencing an urge was not correlated with improved drinking outcomes. and Ineffective skills in this population … Continue reading What what?
Recovery Review 