Heroin News and Research

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Heroin is a very addictive chemical called diacetylmorphine. Heroin is a modified form of morphine, a highly abundant opium derived from the seedpods of the poppy plant.

Anti-heroin vaccine developed at TSRI proven effective in primate models

A vaccine developed at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) to block the "high" of heroin has proven effective in non-human primates. This is the first vaccine against an opioid to pass this stage of preclinical testing.

6 Jun 2017

Internet withdrawal causes physiological changes in digitally-dependent people

Scientists and clinicians from Swansea and Milan have found that some people who use the internet a lot experience significant physiological changes such as increased heart rate and blood pressure when they finish using the internet.

31 May 2017

Study finds opioid dependence and overdose rates after urologic surgery

About 1 in 1,111 patients who undergo urologic surgery for conditions such as prostate cancer and kidney stones experience opioid dependence or overdose (ODO), a Loyola Medicine study has found.

30 May 2017

Psychiatrist explains dangerous effects of cocaine addiction

Last year, almost a million in the UK people snorted, dabbed, smoked or injected cocaine, making it the second most popular drug in the country, after cannabis.

29 May 2017

Role of toxicologists in addressing growing epidemic of opioid abuse

On a global level, it is estimated that 20% of adults suffer from pain, and 10% are being newly diagnosed with chronic pain each year.

25 May 2017

Intraoperative methadone offers promise to reduce need for pain medications during recovery

Patients undergoing spinal fusion surgery who are treated with methadone during the procedure require significantly less intravenous and oral opioids to manage postoperative pain, reports a new study published in the May issue of Anesthesiology, the peer-reviewed medical journal of the American Society of Anesthesiologists.

24 Apr 2017

How physicians can prevent opioid abuse while providing adequate pain relief

Rather than being considered a miracle pill that magically takes away pain, prescription opioids are increasingly being seen as a precursor to heroin addiction and the cause of potentially deadly overdoses themselves.

19 Apr 2017

Injection drug use linked to increase in immune activation, says researcher

The use of heroin and other illicit drugs has been shown to trigger a response from the body's immune system.

13 Apr 2017

Oxytocin system may be key target for developing medications to treat opioid addiction

A new review of published research indicates that the oxytocin system—a key player in social reward and stress regulation—is profoundly affected by opioid use.

5 Apr 2017

Six important things to know about opioid crisis

While opioid drugs play an important role in pain management, an alarming increase in opioid diversion, opioid use disorder, and opioid-related mortality and morbidity in recent years has created a healthcare crisis in the United States.

5 Apr 2017

Heroin use linked to epigenetic alterations in the brain

Heroin use is associated with excessive histone acetylation, an epigenetic process that regulates gene expression, and more years of drug use correlate with higher levels of hyperacetylation, according to research conducted at The Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and published in the journal Biological Psychiatry.

22 Mar 2017

Poison control centers receive one call every 45 minutes about pediatric exposure to opioids

A new study published online today by Pediatrics and conducted by the Center for Injury Research and Policy and the Central Ohio Poison Center at Nationwide Children's Hospital found that there were more than 188,000 calls to US Poison Control Centers for pediatric exposure to opioids from January 2000 through December 2015, averaging 32 calls a day or one every 45 minutes.

20 Mar 2017

Drug or alcohol problems among veterans may increase risk of suicide, study finds

Veterans who have drug or alcohol problems are more than twice as likely to die by suicide as their comrades, a new study finds. And women veterans with substance use disorders have an even higher rate of suicide -- more than five times that of their peers, the research shows.

16 Mar 2017

Heroin use linked to epigenetic alterations in the brain

The past few years have seen an explosion of heroin abuse and deaths from opiate overdose. But little is known about the molecular underpinnings of heroin addiction.

14 Mar 2017

Improving women's health can lead to sharp reduction in domestic violence, study shows

Chronically ill low-income women who thought they were dying experienced a sharp reduction in domestic violence after getting access to a life-saving treatment, a Johns Hopkins University-led study found.

8 Mar 2017

CRNAs urge patients to learn about risks, benefits of pain relief treatments

The opioid crisis is one of the largest challenges facing today's healthcare professionals and the patients for whom they care.

8 Mar 2017

Brain scans could improve prediction of problem drug use among teenagers

There's an idea out there of what a drug-addled teen is supposed to look like: impulsive, unconscientious, smart, perhaps - but not the most engaged. While personality traits like that could signal danger, not every adolescent who fits that description becomes a problem drug user. So how do you tell who's who?

22 Feb 2017

Many adolescents think it is 'probably impossible' to get heroin

Despite reports about the increase in heroin use, more teens believed it was "probably impossible" to get heroin in 2014 than in 2002, according to a Saint Louis University study.

21 Feb 2017

High-pressure culture of sports could increase risk of substance addiction among athletes, study finds

As she was planning her study to look into the role physical activity and sport play in the development of substance addiction, Laurie de Grace was forewarned that she may have trouble finding any recovering addicts with a sporting background to speak with.

13 Feb 2017

Deep brain stimulation can reduce heroin relapse in rat models of addiction, TSRI study shows

Scientists at The Scripps Research Institute have found that deep brain stimulation (DBS) can greatly reduce the compulsion to use heroin in standard rat models of addiction.

2 Feb 2017