Exploring Internet addiction

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Bath Salts’ Stimulant Could Be More Addictive Than Meth

Main Category: Alcohol / Addiction / Illegal Drugs
Article Date: 12 Jul 2013 – 1:00 PDT

‘Bath Salts’ Stimulant Could Be More Addictive Than Meth

“We observed that rats will press a lever more often to get a single infusion of MPDV than they will for meth, across a fairly wide dose range,” said TSRI Associate Professor Michael A. Taffe, who was the principal investigator of the study.

The findings are described by the journalNeuropharmacology online ahead of the publication’s August 2013 print issue.

A New Threat from an Old Source

MDPV (3,4-methylenedioxypyrovalerone) and other “bath salts” drugs are actually derived from cathinone, the principal active ingredient in khat, a leaf chewed for its stimulant effects throughout northeast Africa and the Arabian peninsula. Synthesized by pharmaceutical companies decades ago but never used, cathinone derivatives were rediscovered by underground chemists in the early 2000s. The drugs have been sold as “bath salts” or “plant food” to skirt laws against marketing them for internal use, but in the U.S., UK, Canada and many other countries, their sale for any purpose is now banned.

Cathinone derivatives inhibit the normal removal of the neurotransmitters dopamine, noradrenaline and serotonin from synapses (the small gap separating neurons that enables cell-to-cell communication). In this way, the derivatives disturb the activity of brain networks that mediate desire, pleasure, muscle movements and cognition. Users have described classic stimulant effects such as an initial euphoria, increased physical activity, an inability to sleep and a lack of desire for food or water – plus almost irresistible cravings to take more of the drug. Higher doses bring a strong risk of paranoid psychoses, violence and suicide.

A few years ago, the sudden rise in anecdotal reports of these drugs’ dangerous effects prompted Taffe and his TSRI colleague, chemist Associate Professor Tobin J. Dickerson, to set up studies with laboratory animals. “The drugs had not yet been scheduled, and we were able to work out how to synthesize them in sufficient quantities for animal testing,” said Dickerson.

“One of the great strengths of TSRI with its multidisciplinary, collaborative environment is that we can get started on researching these drugs even before the drugs are available in pure form from the ordinary scientific suppliers,” Taffe said.

In five other studies published over the past year, Taffe, Dickerson and their laboratories have looked at the effects of MDPV and a related “bath salts” cathinone derivative, mephedrone, in a range of animal models.

Repetitive Behaviors

In this new study, the researchers directly compared some of MDPV’s major stimulant effects to those of methamphetamine.

In a standard method for evaluating stimulant drugs, the animals were able to dose themselves intravenously by pressing a lever. As is typical for addictive stimulants, the rats maintained a steady self-administration of each drug whenever they could. In one set of tests designed to quantify how much the rats desired each drug, they could get another infusion only by making ever-greater numbers of lever presses.

“When we increased how many lever presses a rat would have to emit to get an additional infusion of drug, we observed that rats emitted about 60 presses on average for a dose of METH but up to about 600 for MDPV – some rats would even emit 3,000 lever presses for a single hit of MDPV,” said TSRI Research Associate Shawn M. Aarde, who was first author of the study. “If you consider these lever presses a measure of how much a rat will work to get a drug infusion, then these rats worked more than 10 times harder to get MDPV.”

MDPV increased the average activity level of the animals. But at higher – albeit still modest – doses, it produced repetitive behaviors similar to the tooth-grinding and compulsive skin-picking seen in human meth and MDPV users. “One stereotyped behavior that we often observed was a rat repeatedly licking the clear plastic walls of its operant chamber – a behavior that was sometimes uninterruptable,” said Aarde. “One could say MDPV turned some rats into ‘window lickers’ of a sort.”

Chemical Variations

Reports on human MDPV users suggest that the drug’s behavioral effects can persist for lengthy periods after drug use stops, and Taffe and Aarde are now setting up studies of MDPV’s long-term behavioral effects.

“MDPV looks like it’s going to stick around as a recreational stimulant, because it is so potent,” said Taffe.

He notes, however, that in the wake of the criminalization of first-generation cathinone derivatives, new members of this drug class are being invented that will also require study. He hopes in time to be able to anticipate how future chemical variations on the cathinone theme will change the way these drugs act on the brain.

“We’d like the ability to predict, for example, which ones have the highest abuse potential, which are more likely to have long-term toxicity issues, and which carry high risks of acute lethal consequences,” Taffe said.

Long-term cannabis use may blunt the brain’s motivation system

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/07/130701081053.htm#.UeSwsXCTPzM.gmail

New efforts to prevent prescription drug abuse – WSFA.com: News Weather and Sports for Montgomery, AL.

http://www.wsfa.com/story/22453484/new-efforts-to-prevent-prescription-drug-abuse#.Uaf4DJl-LiE.gmail

Best of the Week Your Addiction and Recovery Update

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Normal or Not? When Body-Appearance Obsession Becomes a Disorder

By Wynne Parry, LiveScience Contributor | LiveScience.com – 7 hrs ago

Editor’s Note: With the release of the latest edition of the mental health manual, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (the DSM), LiveScience takes a close look at some of the disorders it defines. This series asks the fundamental question: What is normal, and what is not?

A disfiguring bump on the nose that seems to scream for plastic surgery; eyebrows that appear to get thicker and thicker, requiring constant plucking; bodybuilding that never seems to build enough muscle to satisfy — the obsessions that come with body dysmorphic disorder (BDD) can take many forms.

To the rest of the world, that bump, the eyebrows, the not-buff-enough muscles or other perceived imperfections appear, at worst, unremarkable. But for a person who suffers from BDD, the preoccupation with a feature he or she believes to be grotesque or defective can take a heavy toll, demanding hours of fussing or agonizing.

“People with BDD spend so much time preoccupied with their perceived defect and trying to hide it, that their lives are really limited — it fills their days,” said Robin Rosenberg, a clinical psychologist and co-author of the psychology textbook “Abnormal Psychology” (Worth Publishers, 2009). [The 10 Most Controversial Psychiatric Disorders]

“They might have repeated surgeries for something that no one would notice; then, of course, they end up getting noticed because the repeated surgeries make them look weird,” Rosenberg said.

Body dysmorphic disorder was included in the previous edition of the mental health manual Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV), and with the release of the new edition, DSM-5, it’s still classified as a diagnosis, but with some changes. The new DSM-5, released on May 22, includes a new emphasis on the compulsions associated with BDD — for example, repeatedly combing one’s hair to cover up an imagined scalp problem, or spending hours applying and reapplying makeup to cover a few pimples. Because of this change, simply being obsessed with a perceived defect is no longer enough for a diagnosis, Rosenberg said.

Although he was never publicly diagnosed, “King of Pop” Michael Jackson is considered a poster boy for BDD. The morphing structure of his face, including the cleft chin and the narrowed nose, presented evidence of extensive surgery. (His change in complexion is attributed to a skin pigment condition known as vitiligo.)

BDD falls toward the extreme end of a continuum of behavior that focuses on bodily appearance, Rosenberg said. It’s not considered abnormal for some women to change outfits several times before going out, or for a man to spend time on a comb-over to hide a bald spot. Likewise, up to a point, the decision to get plastic surgery is not necessarily a pathological one, she said. 

To suffer from BDD, someone must perceive some aspect of his or her body as significantly “defective” (even though the “defect” is minor, if it exists at all). In addition, that perception must cause significant distress and impair his or her ability to function.

For instance, if someone refuses to leave the house because of a zit, that could be a flag for a mental health professional to consider whether or not that person has BDD, she said.

Best of the Week Your Addiction and Recovery Update

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Best of the Week Your Addiction and Recovery Update

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First Person: ADHD Diagnosis Ends Years of Addiction

 

By Christopher F. Hyer | Yahoo! Contributor Network – 3 hrs ago

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  Christopher Hyer: “When I was 16, …

• The fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) will be released in May. Yahoo is featuring first-person stories from Americans who are diagnosed with some of the most common mental health disorders in the United States. Here’s one story.

FIRST PERSON | When I was 16, smoking pot and drinking cases of beer were my medication for ADHD — although I didn’t know that’s what I had at the time. From what I could tell, ADHD diagnostics didn’t commonly exist when I was in high school.

All my friends drank beer and smoked pot. Here in the desert of Midland, Texas, there’s practically nothing to do but drink and hit house parties. In school, I could not sit in class and could not understand my assignments, and when there was too much distraction, my mind floated away. I was a straight-A student until I started missing class, and I had high anxiety after that. Throughout my early 20s and 30s, this chaos impacted my work, friends and relationships.

I attended treatment facilities and psychiatric hospitals. Each would make a fresh diagnosis: alcoholism, substance abuse, schizophrenia and bi-polar disorder. I was baffled as to my condition and in turmoil over what would be diagnosed next. When I was 35, after three stints in mental institutions and four in drug rehabilitation centers, I was diagnosed as an adult with ADHD.

I went to a neurologist in Midland, and he asked several questions and included my drug problem and alcohol abuse. He asked if I heard of ADHD. I thought this was a child’s problem, I informed him. He gave me a new prescription of Adderall. Finally, at 44, I was sober and taking my medication as prescribed. Since then, I haven’t drank or done drugs.

Now at 50, my whole view of life is different. I had to start my life anew, but now, financially and mentally, I’m OK, and I think my life will remain stable. I had to learn how to cope with my new life. I am able to collect my thoughts, and my anxieties are few. My religious belief is strong. My faith in God and prayer is a daily habit for me. (My religious beliefs in God have been with me since childhood, but faith alone in the early years was unlikely to overcome addiction.)

I do understand that I am taking chances with Adderall, which is addictive. But my spiritual recovery is how I live. The medicine is just an aid to help.

First Person: With Schziophrenia, You Can’t Live in the Shadows

By Jason Jepson | Yahoo! Contributor Network – 5 hrs ago 

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The fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) will be released in May. Yahoo is featuring first-person stories from Americans who are diagnosed with some of the most common mental health disorders in the United States. Here’s one story.

FIRST PERSON | My mom handed me the phone, “It’s for you.”

“Mr. Jepson, this is the Henrico County Police Department. Come outside.”

What was this? I thought. I felt like a criminal.

I went outside, and saw the police with shields.

“Put down the telephone,” one of them asked over the telephone.

I did so after he told me to come outside. It was raining. I walked on the driveway.

“Get on your knees!” another one yelled.

“Put your hands in the air!” another officer yelled.

About four police officers rushed toward me.

“Lay on your stomach,” the same officer said in a monotone voice.

There was a river of water running down the driveway at my parents’ house in Virginia back in 2005. My whole front got wet as they put me in handcuffs. The police were there because I refused to take my medication, and it was showing. I was 24. This wasn’t the first time I had gone to the mental hospital.

I thought it was the end, but really it was a new beginning.

My first stay in a mental hospital was during my time in the Army. It was voluntary. I was a diagnosed with schizophrenia in 2004 while I was stationed at Fort Irwin, Calif., in the Mojave Desert. I was hearing voices in my head, and II thought I had special powers that allowed me to use my telepathy to talk back. Looking back, my illness really broke out after I experience hazing. I was duct-taped. Sometimes people didn’t believe that I experience hazing, because I have schizophrenia, but I assure you I did. I was 23 years old, and I was later honorably discharged.

When I was home, I didn’t take my medication, and my life was spiraling out of control. Without risperidone, I would probably be homeless or in jail. Now I get injections of my medication, and I take a pill every day.

I perceive myself as optimistic, yet hesitant or cautious. I sometimes worry whether I can do everyday things like leave my apartment. With this disorder, I’ve experienced mood fluctuations. It is in fact known as a mood disorder. I go to the veteran’s hospital for therapy on Mondays and Fridays. I do my own laundry and grocery shopping and cleaning.

Schizophrenia can be treated, and just because you have a mental illness doesn’t mean you can’t be productive. It is not the patent’s fault he has schizophrenia or any mental illness, for that matter. We were just dealt a bad hand.

Everyone has issues. Schizophrenia, however, is a full-time job and a marriage at the same time. It dominates your time and can be very stressful. And dealing with this stigma is hard. I have to really know someone before I tell someone I have schizophrenia. I wait until we are good friends and perhaps have already shared other secrets. I think most people see those living with schizophrenia as dangerous (like, for instance, a serial killer) or deranged. But chances are, I can write better than they can.

If anything, you just have to conclude some people will never understand your condition.