What is Opiate Drug Addiction and How is it Treated?
Opiate drug addiction can occur when pain medication prescribed by a physician are abused and taken in dosages beyond the prescribed amount. It can also occur when a person takes illegal, recreational narcotics, such as heroin.
One of the big problems with opiate drug addiction is that the addict’s ability to produce natural pain killers, called endorphins, is suppressed by blocking pain receptors that causes them to be produced. The addict is more prone to pain, which caused him or her to seek more drugs to suppress that pain, setting up a vicious cycle. Without treatment the addiction can result in overdose followed by death.
Addiction can result from prescription pain killers in some cases. Someone is prescribed an opiate, such as Vicodin or Oxycotin to handle a sports injury and find him or herself still taking the drug long after the initial injury has been healed, thanks to the vicious cycle of pain followed by more medication followed by more pain. Prescription drug addiction has become a major problem, according to the Department of Justice. It is estimated that 36 million Americans have abused prescription drugs, including opiates, at least once in their lives.
According to WebMD, withdrawals from opiate drug addiction can be hard to endure and is a leading cause of relapse. During a gradual detoxification program, certain drugs, such as methadone, are used to suppress the drug craving symptoms without providing the euphoria related to opiates. The dosage of these drugs is gradually decreased as the patient is freed from the physical dependency to the drug. There are also rapid detoxification procedures that involve the patient being given powerful opiate blocking drugs while being placed under general anesthesia. This procedure is not considered more effective than the more traditional kinds of detox and can be more dangerous.
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