It is an unfortunate truth that many Americans are addicted to painkillers and opioids, and even adolescents are abusing these drugs. And as many are aware, drug use can negatively impact many aspects of a person’s life, and drug use may exhaust their personal funds, cause social withdrawal, cause loss of a job, and more. Worse yet, being addicted to heroin or addicted to opioids in general can lead to dangerous and even fatal overdoses. Concerned family members and friends may intervene, and help the addict get to a heroin rehab center or methadone clinics in Illinois (for an example) for treatment. Methadone clinics in Illinois, for Chicago residents for example, may act as replacement therapy if it’s deemed necessary. A Chicago resident may find methadone clinics in Illinois online, for example, on the addict’s behalf. What is there to know about addiction in the United States today and how to treat it?
Americans and Addiction
Who is abusing prescription drugs and heroin? Adults and adolescents alike are abusing these drugs, and statistics are being compiled to track the harmful use of these drugs. Back in 2015, for a fairly recent example, around 21,000 adolescents or so had used heroin within the previous 12 months, and around 5,000 were current heroin users at the time. What is more, around 6,000 adolescents had a heroin use disorder as of 2014. Speaking more broadly, in 2015, around 20.5 million Americans aged 12 and up had a substance abuse disorder in 2015, and two million had disorders involving prescription pain relievers and 591,000 had heroin abuse problems. In fact, it is believed that four in five heroin users had started out their habit from misusing prescription painkillers. Around 25% of those who use heroin end up developing an opioid addiction in particular.
This can have a devastating impact on one’s life. Not the least of which is the serious risk of overdosing, which may send them to the hospital or even kill them. In fact, right now drug overdoses rank first among accidental causes of death in the United States, and in 2015 in particular, some 52,404 lethal overdoses took place. Often, an abuser will overdose on their drug of choice while alone in their residence, and no one is available to take them to the hospital or better yet, intervene on their drug habit. And even if a painkiller abuser is not killed from their drug use, they may still end up in the hospital. In general, drug use may use up a person’s entire personal savings to fund their habit, and they may even resort to theft to keep funding it. And in many cases, the addict may lose their job and become isolated from friends and family. What can be done about this? There are some options.
Methadone
This is an opioid that sometimes acts as a painkiller, but in other cases, it can be used as a step in treating a heroin addiction. This particular drug will be prescribed by one’s doctor and can be used in tablet, powder, or liquid form. This drug may be abused or cause an addiction, however, so a patient’s doctor will closely monitor its use. It should be noted that this drug will affect the way that the human brain responds to pain, and this can cause relief. What is more, methadone use can block the high that a person may get from using heroin, codeine, morphine, and related drugs. Ordinarily, this drug is prescribed for surgery and injury patients who are in a lot of pain, but it can be used to ease someone off of a heroin addiction as well.
After an intervention, if a heroin addict agrees to get help, their friends and family may look for local methadone clinics for them. This may involve an Internet search based on their area, such as “methadone clinics in Illinois” or “nearby methadone clinics in Miami FL” and getting the address and contact information from such clinics. There, medical staff can use methadone and other methods to help free a heroin addict of their current addiction and put them on a course to recovery. Detox centers, meanwhile, are where addicts can be safely monitored by medical professionals while they allow themselves to detox.
