Addiction is a primary, chronic and relapsing brain disease that affects the health, social and economic welfare across the societies. An opioid dependence occurs due to brain abnormalities resulting from chronic use of heroin, oxycodone and other morphine-derived drugs. According to a 2016 review published in the Journal of Addiction Medicine – the official journal of the American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM) – psychosocial intervention, along with medications, is the best treatment option for opioid addiction.
"Given the current state of the opioid overdose epidemic, it is critical that patients seeking help for opioid addiction have access to comprehensive treatment that includes highly effective medications whose effects may be enhanced with the provision of psychosocial interventions," says Dr. Karen Dugosh, Ph.D., of Treatment Research Institute, Philadelphia.
Psychosocial intervention for opioid addiction
Three different types of medications – methadone, buprenorphine and naltrexone – are presently used to treat opioid addiction. ASAM has recently issued guidelines for the use of these drugs, according to which these medications are approved for use "within the framework of medical, social, and psychological support," and can be used along with psychosocial treatment.
To support this finding, the researchers went through three reviews and 27 recent studies indicating the efficacy of providing psychosocial interventions in combination with medications to treat opioid addiction. However, they also pinpointed certain limitations in terms of identifying the most effective combinations of medications and psychosocial treatments. Of the 27 studies, nine claimed that psychosocial interventions are beneficial for patients being treated with methadone.
On the contrary, only three of eight studies found positive effects of psychosocial interventions with buprenorphine, while an equal number of studies advocating the use of psychosocial treatments with oral naltrexone. Dr. Dugosh and her colleagues feel that more research is needed to support the claim regarding use of psychosocial interventions for opioid addiction. "As opioid use and overdose deaths in this country exceed epidemic proportions," they concluded. "The urgency for an expanded research agenda on best practices for comprehensive treatment could not be more critical."
Detox therapy: An overview
A 2016 report by ASAM revealed that of the 21.5 million Americans aged 12 or older who had a substance use disorder in 2014, 1.9 million had an addiction to prescription pain relievers and 586,000 had a substance use disorder involving heroin.
A detox therapy is recommended for opioid addiction patients to improve their chances of successful recovery and prevent relapses. In an ideal procedure, medications like buprenorphine and naltrexone, along with a proper counseling, can help patients stay on the road to recovery. This process takes place in an inpatient rehab center with the help of adequate medical intervention.
Time and again, studies have suggested that drug addiction can be better controlled with long-term maintenance therapy, using either methadone or buprenorphine. Although, patients undergoing such a treatment are still opioid-dependent, they often remain untouched by the destructive effects of drug addiction. Visit any detox treatment center Arizona, and you will come across some addicts who have been taking medicines for decades as they tend to fall back to illicit drug use after the maintenance therapy is stopped, while some others are recommended to taper off the therapy over months to years.
Be it at a detox treatment center in Arizona or somewhere else in the country, a therapist needs to know an addict's complete history of drug abuse before starting any treatment, as most people tend to relapse even after achieving long-term abstinence. It is not easy to fight the vicious cycle of addiction, recovery and relapse and getting back to the square one. If you or someone you love is dependent on drugs and displays increasing risk of developing other health-related issues, get in touch with the Arizona Detox Helpline at 866-593-8453 before it grows into an unmanageable problem.
Source : articlesbase.com
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