The potential of psychedelics as a preventative and auxiliary therapy for drug abuse.
Authors: Vargas-Perez H, Doblin R
PMID: 23773089 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE] (Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews)
Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews - November 14, 2014 Category: Addiction Tags: Curr Drug Abuse Rev Source Type: research
Estimates of cocaine use in Milan.
Authors: Zuzzi S, Rossi C, Tomba GS
Abstract
A comparative analysis of three different estimation methods of cocaine use in Milan, Italy, is carried out, including an analysis of the size and trends of the underlying reference population. The three cocaine use estimates are derived from wastewater analysis, a "street" survey and one-source capture-recapture analysis of administrative sanctions for drug possession. All three data sources span several years during the decade 2000-2010. For each method, assumptions and limitations are discussed. It is concluded, although the amount of data regarding cocaine u...
Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews - November 14, 2014 Category: Addiction Tags: Curr Drug Abuse Rev Source Type: research
Sizing the cannabis market: a demand-side and user-specific approach in seven European countries.
Authors: van Laar M, Frijns T, Trautmann F, Lombi L
Abstract
Demand-based estimates of total cannabis consumption rarely consider differences among different user types and variation across countries. To describe cannabis consumption patterns and estimate annual consumption for different user types across EU Member States, a web survey in Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Sweden and United Kingdom (England & Wales) collected data on cannabis use patterns from 3,922 persons who had consumed cannabis at least once in the past year. They were classified into four groups based on ...
Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews - November 14, 2014 Category: Addiction Tags: Curr Drug Abuse Rev Source Type: research
On illicit drug policies; methods of evaluation and comments on recent practices.
Authors: Trovato G, Vezzani A
Abstract
This contribution provides an overview of different approaches used to analyse drug policies within and across countries. Besides the great number of cost of illness studies which have contributed to the assessment of health harms and risks associated to the drug use, most of the recent efforts have focused on the creation of synthetic indices to classify countries around the world or to evaluate particular law enforcement policies in some countries. This is probably due to a general lack of comparable data across countries. The wide variety of budgetary practices in ...
Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews - November 14, 2014 Category: Addiction Tags: Curr Drug Abuse Rev Source Type: research
Methods for estimating incidence of drug use: a review.
Authors: Sánchez-Niubò A, Mammone A, Tomba GS
Abstract
Several methods for estimating drug use incidence, that have been used in the literature or that could be used, having been used in a different framework, are described and commented. The applicability of the different methods depends on available data and knowledge about relevant parameters. The many similarities between drug use incidence estimation and estimation of disease incidence are highlighted, but also the distinguishing aspects that make drug use incidence estimation a challenge to standard statistical methods.
PMID: 24308520 [Pub...
Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews - November 14, 2014 Category: Addiction Tags: Curr Drug Abuse Rev Source Type: research
Monitoring the size and protagonists of the drug market: combining supply and demand data sources and estimates.
Authors: Rossi C
Abstract
The size of the illicit drug market is an important indicator to assess the impact on society of an important part of the illegal economy and to evaluate drug policy and law enforcement interventions. The extent of illicit drug use and of the drug market can essentially only be estimated by indirect methods based on indirect measures and on data from various sources, as administrative data sets and surveys. The combined use of several methodologies and data sets allows to reduce biases and inaccuracies of estimates obtained on the basis of each of them separately. This approach ha...
Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews - November 14, 2014 Category: Addiction Tags: Curr Drug Abuse Rev Source Type: research
Length of stay in different drug using states: lifestyles of problem and recreational drug consumers.
CONCLUSIONS: The comparative analysis of several data sources allowed a more complete overview of the different subpopulations on the drug scene and provides interesting data to understand and to estimate parameters for dynamic models of drug use.
PMID: 24308522 [PubMed - in process] (Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews)
Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews - November 14, 2014 Category: Addiction Tags: Curr Drug Abuse Rev Source Type: research
The recent expansion in the Australian cocaine market: who are the new users and what are the harms?
We examined general population trends in cocaine use and harmful practices and use of related stimulants between 1998 and 2010, and conducted age-period-cohort analyses using five repeated cross-sections of Australia's National Drug Strategy Household Survey. The results indicate past year cocaine use prevalence has increased significantly since 2004, to its highest point in the past 12 years; 2.1% in 2010. But frequency of cocaine use has not increased. Moreover, most harmful practices (injecting, high-quantity use) have remained stable. Changes in the cocaine market appear related to changes in the Australian methampheta...
Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews - November 14, 2014 Category: Addiction Tags: Curr Drug Abuse Rev Source Type: research
The whole is just the sum of its parts: limited polydrug use among the "big three" expensive drugs in the United States.
Authors: Caulkins JP, Everingham S, Kilmer B, Midgette G
Abstract
Data from surveys of arrestees and the household population in the U.S. suggest there is only modest overlap among demand for the big three expensive illegal drugs (cocaine/crack, heroin, and methamphetamine). In particular, the number of chronic users of these substances (defined as consuming on four or more days in the previous month) is only about 10% below a naïve estimate obtained by simply summing the numbers of chronic users for each of the three substances, while ignoring polydrug use entirely. This finding does not gainsay that pol...
Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews - November 14, 2014 Category: Addiction Tags: Curr Drug Abuse Rev Source Type: research
Analysis of urine from pooled urinals - a novel method for the detection of novel psychoactive substances.
Authors: Archer JR, Hudson S, Wood DM, Dargan PI
Abstract
Current data on the epidemiology of recreational drug use is largely based on population and self-population surveys of drug use. In addition, increasingly, particularly for novel psychoactive substances, data collected from web monitoring systems is used to collect information on early trends in the use of NPS and the drugs available to users. All of these indicators rely on users self-report of the drug(s) that they are using, or more accurately the drugs that they perceive they are using. Numerous recent studies have demonstrated significant vari...
Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews - November 14, 2014 Category: Addiction Tags: Curr Drug Abuse Rev Source Type: research
Epidemiology of illicit drug use and policy evaluation.
Authors: Rossi C, Scalia Tomba G
PMID: 24387077 [PubMed - in process] (Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews)
Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews - November 14, 2014 Category: Addiction Tags: Curr Drug Abuse Rev Source Type: research
Alcohol hangover and the workplace: a need for research.
Authors: Frone MR, Verster JC
PMID: 24397467 [PubMed - in process] (Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews)
Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews - November 14, 2014 Category: Addiction Tags: Curr Drug Abuse Rev Source Type: research
Hangover research needs: proceedings of the 5th Alcohol Hangover Research Group meeting.
Authors: Verster JC, Alford C, Bervoets AC, de Klerk S, Grange JA, Hogewoning A, Jones K, Kruisselbrink DL, Owen L, Piasecki TM, Raasveld SJ, Royle S, S.ske WS, Smith GS, Stephens R, Alcohol Hangover Research Group
PMID: 24444044 [PubMed - in process] (Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews)
Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews - November 14, 2014 Category: Addiction Tags: Curr Drug Abuse Rev Source Type: research
Role of ghrelin in drug abuse and reward-relevant behaviors: a burgeoning field and gaps in the literature.
Authors: Revitsky AR, Klein LC
Abstract
Ghrelin is a gut-brain hormone that regulates energy balance through food consumption. While ghrelin is well known for its role in hypothalamic activation and homeostatic feeding, more recent evidence suggests that ghrelin also is involved in hedonic feeding through the dopaminergic reward pathway. This paper investigated how ghrelin administration (intraperitoneal, intracerebroventricular, or directly into dopaminergic reward-relevant brain regions) activates the dopaminergic reward pathway and associated reward-relevant behavioral responses in rodents. A total of 1...
Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews - November 14, 2014 Category: Addiction Tags: Curr Drug Abuse Rev Source Type: research
Pavlovian sign-tracking model of alcohol abuse.
Authors: Tomie A, Sharma N
Abstract
While poorly controlled alcohol drinking is a prominent symptom of alcohol abuse, its environmental determinants remain poorly understood. The Sign-Tracking Model (STM), developed by Tomie and his associates, postulates that poorly controlled alcohol drinking is due to the development of signal-directed behaviors induced by Pavlovian sign-tracking procedures. In laboratory studies of animal learning, presentation of the lever (conditioned stimulus, CS) followed by the presentation of the food (unconditioned stimulus, US) induces sign-tracking conditioned response (CR) pe...
Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews - November 14, 2014 Category: Addiction Tags: Curr Drug Abuse Rev Source Type: research
