Drugs and it's effects

There have been so many questions about the effect of drugs on a person. Some claim their drug use will not harm them. While others say that it is dangerous to your health. Some even say that the drugs they use have medicinal value. After an extensive study on drugs and the effects they have on the human body, we have come up with this summary hopefully to help you understand what drugs and drug abuse/addiction can do to the human body.

Marijuana

Short-term effects of marijuana use include problems with memory and learning; distorted perception; difficulty in thinking and problem-solving; loss of coordination; and increased heart rate, anxiety, and panic attacks. In addition, researchers have discovered that learned behaviours, also deteriorate. Continuing to smoke marijuana can lead to abnormal functioning of lung tissue injured or destroyed by marijuana smoke. The amount of tar inhaled by marijuana smokers and the level of carbon monoxide absorbed are three to five times greater than among tobacco smokers. A study of has shown that critical skills related to attention, memory, and learning are impaired among people who use marijuana heavily, even after discontinuing its use for at least 24 hours. The findings suggest that the greater impairment among heavy users is likely due to an alteration of brain activity produced by marijuana. Longitudinal research on marijuana use among young people below college age indicates those who used have lower achievement than the non-users, more acceptance of deviant behaviour, more delinquent behaviour and aggression, greater rebelliousness, poorer relationships with parents, and more associations with delinquent and drug-using friends.

Methamphetamines (Shabu)

Methamphetamine is an addictive stimulant drug that strongly activates certain systems in the brain. Methamphetamine is closely related chemically to amphetamine, but the central nervous system effects of methamphetamine are greater. Methamphetamine appears to have a neuro-toxic effect, damaging brain cells that contain dopamine and serotonin. Over time, methamphetamine abuse can result in symptoms like those of Parkinson's disease, a severe movement disorder. Users may become addicted quickly. The central nervous system (CNS) actions that result from taking even small amounts of methamphetamine include increased wakefulness, increased physical activity, decreased appetite, increased respiration, hypothermia, and euphoria. Other CNS effects include irritability, insomnia, confusion, tremors, convulsions, anxiety, paranoia, and aggressiveness. Hypothermia and convulsions can result in death. Methamphetamine causes increased heart rate and blood pressure and can cause irreversible damage to blood vessels in the brain, producing strokes. Other effects of methamphetamine include respiratory problems, irregular heartbeat, and extreme anorexia. Its use can result in cardiovascular collapse and death.

Ecstasy

MDMA (ECSTASY) is known to cause brain damage. Many problems users encounter with MDMA are similar to those found with the use of amphetamines and cocaine. They are: Psychological difficulties, including confusion, depression, sleep problems, drug craving, severe anxiety, and paranoia during and sometimes weeks after taking MDMA (in some cases, psychotic episodes have been reported). Physical symptoms such as muscle tension, involuntary teeth clenching, nausea, blurred vision, rapid eye movement, faintness, and chills or sweating. Increases in heart rate and blood pressure, a special risk for people with circulatory or heart disease. Recent research findings also link MDMA use to long-term damage to those parts of the brain critical to thought and memory. It is believed that the drug causes damage to the neurons that use the chemical serotonin to communicate with other neurons. MDMA has been shown to cause degeneration of neurons containing the neurotransmitter dopamine. Damage to dopamine containing neurons is the underlying cause of the motor disturbances seen in Parkinson's disease. Symptoms of this disease begin with lack of coordination and tremors, and can eventually result in a form of paralysis.

Club Drugs

Club drugs are being used by young adults at all-night dance parties such as "raves" or "trances," dance clubs, and bars. MDMA (Ecstasy), GHB, Rohypnol, ketamine, methamphetamine, and LSD are some of the club or party drugs gaining popularity. Use of club drugs can cause serious health problems and, in some cases, even death. Used in combination with alcohol, these drugs can be even more dangerous.

No club drug is benign. Chronic abuse of MDMA, for example, appears to produce long-term damage to serotonin-containing neurons in the brain. Given the important role that the neurotransmitter serotonin plays in regulating emotion, memory, sleep, pain, and higher order cognitive processes, it is likely that MDMA use can cause a variety of behavioral and cognitive consequences as well as impair memory. Because some club drugs are colorless, tasteless, and odorless, they can be added unobtrusively to beverages by individuals who want to intoxicate or sedate others. There has been an increase in reports of club drugs used to commit sexual assaults.

Inhalants

Inhalants are products found right in the home and are among the most popular and deadly substances kids abuse. Unlike many drugs, inhalant abuse can result in death from the very first use. They sniff or "huff" ordinary household products like nail polish remover, cleaning fluid, gasoline, and spray paint. Inhalants are breathable chemical vapors that produce mind-altering effects. Young people are likely to abuse inhalants, in part, because inhalants are readily available and inexpensive. Parents should see that these substances are monitored closely so that children do not abuse them. Inhalants fall into the following categories:

• Solvents such as paint thinners or solvents, degreasers (dry-cleaning fluids), gasoline, and glues art or office supply solvents, including correction fluids, felt-tip-marker fluid, and electronic contact cleaners

• Gases such as butane gas for lighters and propane tanks, whipping cream aerosols or dispensers (whippets), and refrigerant gases household aerosol propellants and associated solvents in items such as spray paints, hair or deodorant sprays, and fabric protector sprays medical aesthetic gases, such as ether, chloroform, halothane, and nitrous oxide (laughing gas).

• Nitrites such as cyclohexyl nitrite, which is available to the general public; amyl nitrite, which is available only by prescription; and butyl nitrite, which is now an illegal substance Sniffing highly concentrated amounts of the chemicals in solvents or aerosol sprays can directly induce heart failure and death. High concentrations of inhalants also cause death from suffocation by displacing oxygen in the lungs and then in the central nervous system so that breathing ceases. Other irreversible effects are: Hearing Loss; Bone marrow damage; Liver and Kidney damage; Blood oxygen depletion; and Irreversible Brain Damage Organic nitrites ("poppers," "bold," and "rush") and methylene chloride (varnish removers, paint thinners)

Cocaine

Health risks exist regardless of whether cocaine is inhaled (snorted), injected, or smoked. However, it appears that compulsive cocaine use may develop even more rapidly if the substance is smoked rather than snorted. Smoking allows extremely high doses of cocaine to reach the brain very quickly and results in an intense and immediate high. The injecting drug user is also at risk for acquiring or transmitting HIV infection/AIDS if needles or other injection equipment are shared. Physical effects of cocaine use include constricted peripheral blood vessels, dilated pupils, and increased body temperature, heart rate, and blood pressure. High doses of cocaine and/or prolonged use can trigger paranoia. Smoking crack cocaine can produce particularly aggressive paranoid behaviour in users. When addicted individuals stop using cocaine, they may become depressed. This depression causes users to continue to use the drug to alleviate their depression. Prolonged cocaine snorting can result in ulceration of the mucous membrane of the nose and can damage the nasal septum enough to cause it to collapse. Cocaine-related deaths are often a result of cardiac arrest or seizures followed by respiratory arrest.

Researchers have found that the human liver combines cocaine and alcohol to manufacture a third substance, coca ethylene, which intensifies cocaine's euphoric effects and possibly increases the risk of sudden death.

Harmless? We say definitely not! So what do we do about this? First we have already started by your reading this article and learning what drugs can do to you and your loved ones. For those who are already faced with the problem of drug dependency of addiction, you need to seek professional help. Some treatment centers say the TC (Therapeutic Community) model works, then those who use the 12 - step model claim they are more effective, yet others claim that a combination of the two is the best program. There are even some treatment centers who treat their clients/patients like criminals and practice harsh, physical and inhuman treatment programs. Then some families spend so much money to put their drug dependents in the most expensive treatment centers outside of Cebu with the hope that nobody will ever find out that they have an addict in the family.

Well, in my own experience the supposed secret of my drug addiction was in reality "A SECRET THAT EVERYBODY KNEW ABOUT!" We at recovery House do not have any claims to be the best. We have no claims to be of either the TC or 12-step models of rehabilitation, though we believe that both models have its advantages. We offer you the Recovery House Treatment Program. A program that strives to help drug dependents recover from Drug Addiction through Discipline, Responsibility and Understanding in a Humanistic manner of treatment. Some say we are a combination of both TC & 12-step models, but we prefer to say that we offer the Recovery House Treatment Model. We make use of Psychiatrists, Psychologists, Medical Doctors and Recovering Addicts to offer you a more holistic type of treatment at a price that is more affordable than most other private centers. Recovery House was set up with the help of its Chief Executive Officer Mr. Clifford F. Tan and managed by it's Center Director Mr. Vicente G. (Tico) Aldanese. For more information, please contact us at 032-2331881 or 032-2315229 or email us at [email protected]. Or visit our website at www.recoveryhouse.com.ph