Addiction Treatment Blog

Is an addiction taking over your life? With any problem it is very difficult to acknowledge there is a problem and breaking the habit seems impossible. It can take over your life and cause problems in relationships, careers and finances. Seeking help from professionals may be the only way to control the habit. You may need them to help you set goals and targets to allow you to overcome this. However it can be tough and you may need to find the trigger for your relapses, to help you avoid them. This is where hypnosis comes in. Read more…

In 1954, Olds and Milner discovered that there appeared to be pleasure spots in the brain. Implanting electrodes in certain areas of the brain, through which a rat can give itself an electric current by pressing on a lever, produced in most brain areas nothing of note. In some areas, however, the rats seemed keen on the effects of self-stimulation and, in some cases, if left to their own devices would self-stimulate to the exclusion of all else – even food and drink.

As mentioned, noradrenaline was discovered in the brain in 1954. In 1959, a second catecolamine, dopamine, was identified, which was shown to be deficient in Parkinson’s disease.

The later mapping of dopamine-containing neurones has shown that they too, like noradrenergic neurones, tend to originate in a discrete area, the ventral tegmentum. Some of these neurones run to strictly motor areas of the brain and constitute the nigrostriatal system, and it is loss of nerve calls in this pathway that leads to Parkinson’s disease. Read more…

Over the past two decades there appears to have been a shift within health care from an expectation that patients with medical problems should entrust themselves passively to the care of physicians to an expectation that they should co-operate in their own care and indeed have some responsibility for the outcome of medical procedures they undergo. The changes are reflected in the terms we used; the word patient, which means someone who endures, is being replaced by terms such as client or consumer, which suggest a more active and discriminating participant in the medical process.

Nowhere is this shift more clear than when it comes to the question of what is known as informed consent. Informed consent was not an issue in medical practice 20 years ago. Today it forms a central issue in a number of ethical codes from the Nuremberg Code to the Helsinki Code as well as Codes originating from the Food and Drugs Administration (FDA) in the United States and the US Department of Health. Read more…

Separation Liability

Liability for drug induced injuries did not become an issue of general concern until quite recently. However, a number of drug-induced problems from thalidomide in the 1960s to Opren and diethylstilbestrol in the 1970s have caused widespread public disquiet and led to increasing awareness of issues to do with liability. In psychiatry, concern in the UK focuses on the question of benzodiazepine prescribing, while in the US the paramount issue concerns the occurrence of tardive dyskinesia in individuals taking neuroleptics. The question has become an emotive one with some commentators who survey the problem referring to the appalling frequency of drug-induced injury, while others comment on its astonishing tray (1). Whatever the absolute frequencies, contrary probably to public belief, the evidence suggests that the larger the pharmaceutical company, the better its practice regarding drug safety is likely to be (2).

Drug-induced problems may stem from toxic effects of a drug, or toxic effects caused by an impure additive, or from allergic reactions to the drug or its additive. Problems may also stem from over prescribing. For instance, in the case of someone who dies from a resistant bacterial infection, a relative could claim that the subject’s death arose in part from the excessive prescription of antibiotics that in its own right brings about the production of resistant infections. In the case of neuroleptics, problems may be brought about by the overuse of these drugs but this overuse, far from being solely promoted by drug companies stems in part from the current politics of mental health – deaths have stemmed from rapid tranquillisation often by harassed staff in psychiatric units. Read more…

Dependence

Before considering this in detail, we must exclude a type of physical dependence that occurs with a great number of drugs and ordinarily is of little consequence. Many drugs will cause rebound symptoms once they are discontinued. This happens particularly if they block receptors. This blockade leads to the blocked receptors becoming hypersensitive. When the blocking drug is then removed, these receptors are flooded with the normal neurotransmitter and they respond vigorously. It may take 48-72 hours for them to settle back down to normal.

Examples of this are the rebound phenomena that may occur with beta-blockers, such as propranolol, and the cholinergic rebound that may happen after stopping antidepressants with marked anticholinergic effects. Propranolol rebound may lead to palpitations, sweating and flushing. Cholinergic rebound may produce poor sleep and nausea or vomiting. These syndromes are not serious, and high doses of the relevant compounds are stopped abruptly. Read more…

Dependence

The issues of dependence and withdrawal have come up repeatedly through the previous articles we published. They are a primary concern of any taker of psycho-active medication. Some outline of current thinking on these issues therefore seems called for.

It has been traditional to distinguish between physical dependence and psychological dependence. Physical dependence is the state that produces withdrawal syndromes – of which the classic instances are alcohol induced delirium tremens and opiate-induced cold turkey. This is assumed to be physical because withdrawal syndromes are usually intensely physical states with shakes, palpitations, sweating and sometimes even convulsions and death. Some have argued that many individuals are trapped into continuing use of drugs out of a terror at the prospect of withdrawal. Read more…

Effects of Drugs on Sex

Table of Contents

• Potency
• Orgasm
• Libido
• Aphrodisiacs
• Yohimbine
• Trazodone
• Nefazodone and Cyproheptadine
• Glyceril Trinitrate
• Transcutaneous Absorption
• Intracaversonal Injections
• Bethanecol
• Dyspareunia and Orgasm
• Libido
• Anaphrodisiacs
• Sex Addiction Treatment Clinic
• Do You Need Help?

Read more…

The range of sexual difficulties can be devastating.

Table of Contents

• Potency
• Ejaculation and Orgasm
• Libido
  • Sexual Orientation, Objects and Practices
  • The Female Sexual Response
• Sex Addiction Treatment Available
• Do you need help?

Potency

The sexual problem in men that is most likely to lead a request for medical assistance is a disorder of erectile function, leading to impotence. This refers to an inability to achieve or to sustain an erection, and may derive from either an organic or psychogenic source.

The organic causes of impotence stem from either problems with the nervous supply to blood vessels of the penis (neurogenic causes), or problems with the blood vessels themselves (vasculogenic causes). There are a number of other illnesses or disorders which may play a part, from local diseases of the penis, Peyronie’s disease, which involves excessive curvature of the penis (few penises are entirely straight when erect) to diseases which affect the whole body, such as liver or kidney disease. Read more…

Barbiturates

Concerns about the over-prescription of benzodiazepines in recent years have led some prescribers to look at alternative hypnotic agents – either older compounds such as members of the barbiturate or chloral families, antidepressants, or neuroleptics with a sedative profile. There are a number of problems with such prescriptions as will become clear.

Chloral Compounds

Chloral compounds (see the table below) were first produced in 1869. Their sedative effects were quickly recognised, leading to their use as hypnotics among other things. A number of factors militated against their widespread use. One was the difficulty in making them in other than foul tasting liquid formats. The subsequent discovery of the barbiturates, just before the First World War, largely put paid to them. Before that, however, many patients admitted to mental hospitals were treated with chloral draughts and would appear to have done well. Read more…

Benzodiazepine Structure

What is the place for hypnotics in this scheme of things? Basically the same place that alcohol has occupied for centuries. Most of us every so often, if we are anxious, worked up or have a lot of things on our mind will have on occasion resorted to alcohol to knock ourselves out. This it doers effectively on an episodic basis. There are drawbacks to alcohol, however. One is that it may produce a rebound insomnia – it knocks you out but also wakes you up several hours later as the effects wear off. It may also wake you up to pass urine or because of dehydration.

Hypnotics do roughly the same thing, with similar benefits and side effects. Judiciously used, they are wonderful. Taken in the early stages of a problem they may abort the later development of habitual anxiety-based insomnia. Taken too regularly or chronically, they may produce their own problems.

The place for the hypnotics lies in the management of sleeplessness rather than in the management of insomnia. Where there is genuine sleeplessness stemming from jet lag or an underlying physical condition, or problems with falling asleep in what may be uncomfortable circumstances or situations of stress, a hypnotic may be of great benefit. The presumption in these cases is that there is a transient sleeplessness and the condition is being managed until normality returns. In certain circumstances, such as where a chronic physical condition regularly compromises sleep, it would seem that hypnotics can be used chronically without causing much in the lines of dependence or other problems. Under the side effects section below, problems such as the risks posed to driving from sedative effects of these drugs will be outlined but it should also be borne in mind that the fatigue consequent on sleeplessness is seen as a rather trivial issue. Read more…