Category Archives: Brain Health

Addiction consequences

Brain changes effected by drug addiction

September 30, 2016
Brain changes effected

Brain changes effected by drug addiction. Curing the addicted brain from the effects of drug addiction

Brain changes effected by drug addiction: The prefrontal cortex

When the brain changes effected by drug addiction is wearing you down, there will always be some remedial actions to be taken. The prefrontal cortex will enables us to make rational, sound decisions. It also helps us to override impulsive urges. If acted upon, these impulses urges can cause us to act without thinking. This is usually not in our best interest. For instance, suppose I’ve had a bad day at work. I may have an impulsive urge to tell my boss exactly what I think of her. To act on this impulse is not in my best interest. Fortunately, my prefrontal cortex is functioning quite well. I still have my job!

Obviously, this ability to inhibit impulses is very helpful. It enables us to function well in society. It protects us from harm by allowing us to consider the consequences of our actions. However, when the pre-frontal cortex is not functioning correctly, the opposite occurs. Addiction causes changes to the prefrontal cortex. These changes account for two characteristics of addiction: impulsivity and compulsivity.

Impulsivity is the inclination to act upon sudden urges or desires without considering potential consequences. Sometimes people describe impulsivity as living in the present moment without regard to the future. On the other hand, compulsivity is a behavior that an individual feels driven to perform to relieve anxiety. Once a person performs the compulsive behavior, the anxiety goes away and restores comfort. Thus, the presence of these behavioral characteristics in addicted persons indicates that changes to the prefrontal cortex have occurred. Unfortunately, these changes also make the discontinuation of drug use more difficult.

When we talk of addiction changes brain structure and their functions, the message being delivered is that an addiction is a process that coordinates the transition from impulsive to compulsive behavior. Impulsivity occurs during the early stages of addiction. During this phase, people impulsively act on powerful urges to experience the pleasure of their addiction. Anxiety is not associated with the urges during these early stages. Instead, addiction reflects acting on impulsive desire to receive immediate pleasure from the drug or activity. People are not considering the future consequences.

Brain changes effected by drug addiction: The shifting progress of addiction

As addiction progresses a shift begins to occur. At this point, the compulsive aspect of addiction takes hold. When this shift occurs, people are no longer pursuing their addiction solely for pleasure. The compulsions compel them to participate in their addiction to relieve anxious, uncomfortable feelings. These may rise at the mere thought of stopping addiction for any reason (supply shortages, lack of opportunity, etc.). At this later compulsive stage, “pleasure” comes in the form of relief from these anxious, uncomfortable feelings. Thus, despite the negative consequences of addiction, the addictive behavior continues in a compulsive manner.

Finally although addiction damages the brain’s brakes (pre-frontal cortex) this is not to say there is a complete loss of control. We are not slaves to our biology. We have a tremendous amount of control over our actions.  This is true even when impulsive and compulsive forces are operating. This recognition is vitally important if someone wishes to recover from addiction. When a person consciously decides the costs of addiction outweigh its benefits, they become motivated and able stop. This allows them to actively counter the effects of addiction on the frontal cortex and other brain regions. Therefore if this description suits your situation, then you are in the right path and calling doctor Akoury today will go a long way in helping you solve all the addiction problems you may be having.

Brain changes effected by drug addiction: The prefrontal cortex

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milk tea addiction

Understanding depression pain complications

September 30, 2016
Understanding depression pain

Understanding depression pain complications in totality alongside being mindful about the solution for stress will go along way in finding lasting solution

Understanding depression pain complications: What happens with chronic pain and depression?

Understanding depression pain complications is a worthy concern for anyone struggling with both chronic pain and depression. From an expert point of view, it will interest you to note that depression is one of the most common psychological issues facing people who are suffering from chronic pain. This problem if not addressed timely can really complicates the patient’s conditions and treatment. The most worrying thing is that prevalence of these problems is escalating on a daily basis. Like for instance according to the American Pain Foundation, they have registered that about 32 million people in the U.S. alone have had pain lasting longer than one year. And about one quarter to more than half of all the population that complain to their doctors registering depression. And on average up to 65% of those depressed individuals are also complaining of pain and yet again those people whose pain limits their independence are especially likely to get depressed. These statistics are a reflection of how depression and pain are a serious threat globally. It has now become an epidemic that must be addressed from all quarters if we want to enjoy comfort in life says doctor Akoury.

Understanding depression pain complications: Is there a cycle of depression and pain?

One would not be punished for saying that pain is a trigger of depression. In fact it has been established from various studies that pain can provoke an emotional response in everyone. Like for instance if you are struggling with some pain, you may also have high anxiety, irritability, and agitation. These are very normal accompaniment feelings when you are hurting. Even though this is so, the good news about all this process or relations is that under normal circumstances, as pain subsides, so does the stressful response. However with chronic pain, you are likely to constantly feel tense and stressed. That is to say, with time, the constant stress can result in different emotional problems associated with depression. Doctor Akoury MD, who is a veteran addiction expert and founder of AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center says that if you are suffering from these chronic pains and depression then you are likely to experience some of the problems: Altered mood, work issues, fatigue, physical deconditioning, financial concerns, chronic anxiety, weigh gain or weight loss, anger, social sleep disturbances, isolation, legal issues, confused thinking, family stress, reduced sexual activities, fear of injury, decreased self-esteem and irritability.

Finally looking at the list above, it is obvious these are not health experiences one should go through. You can therefore make wise decisions today to be safe from all these by scheduling for an appointment with doctor Dalal Akoury for a one on one professional advice and treatment that will help you have your life reinstated to normalcy.

Understanding depression pain complications: What happens with chronic pain and depression?

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Oxycontin

Explaining depression overlap and chronic pain

September 30, 2016
Explaining depression overlap

Explaining depression overlap and chronic pain ca be very distressful if not corrected

Explaining depression overlap and chronic pain: Neurotransmitters

Scientifically explaining depression overlap and chronic pain is possible and for sure some of the overlap between depression and chronic pain can be explained. According to the experts from AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center under the able leadership of doctor Dalal Akoury MD, it has been established scientifically that depression and chronic pain have a common denominator and that is, they both share some of the same neurotransmitters brain chemicals that act as messengers traveling between nerves. Depression and chronic pain also share some of the same nerve pathways.

Explaining depression overlap and chronic pain: Pressures exacted by pain

Besides that it is important to note that the impact of chronic pain on an individual’s life can also contribute to depression. In fact chronic pain can exact pressure and force you to struggle with tremendous losses, such as the loss of exercise, sleep, social network, relationships, sexual relationships, even a job and income. These losses can make you feel depressed and bring a total change in your life and even to that of your loved ones. With this depression will then magnify the pain and reduces your coping skills. It therefore means that when you used to exercise and be active when you felt stressed, with chronic pain you can no longer deal with stress in this manner.

Finally experts while carrying out research had put into comparison people with chronic pain and depression to those who only suffer chronic pain. After the study, it was established from that those who suffer from both depression and chronic pain report more intense pain, less control of their lives and more unhealthy coping strategies. That therefore means that since chronic pain and depression are so intertwined, they are often treated together. In fact, some medications can improve both chronic pain and depression. That is why you need to seek for a more professional input if any of these discussions suits your situation. And before we come to a conclusion of this article, if you are wondering on where to begin in terms of finding solutions about explaining depression overlap and chronic pain, you need not to wonder anymore because we are here to help you do the right thing and with the right people. Remember that Dr. Akoury made a decision to create a medical center whose main objective is to transform each individual’s life through increasing awareness about health and wellness and by empowering individuals to find their own inner healing power. Dr. Akoury’s practice focuses on personalized medicine through healthy lifestyle choices that deal with primary prevention and underlying causes instead of patching up symptoms. This is what doctor Akoury intends to achieve if only you can schedule for an appointment with her today.

Explaining depression overlap and chronic pain: Neurotransmitters

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Addicted brain

Mesolimbic pathway and drug seeking

September 30, 2016
Mesolimbic pathway

Mesolimbic pathway and drug seeking. Hypothalamus area of the brain and drug addiction.

Mesolimbic pathway and drug seeking: Drug cravings to the brain

From our basic understanding of the purpose and functioning of the brains reward system in the previous postings, we can interrogate it a little bit further in several ways. The circuit most associated with pleasure and reward is the mesolimbic pathway which is located in the brainstem. The objective of this area of the brain is primarily concerned with basic survival. Within the mesolimbic pathway is an area called the ventral tegmental area (VTA). The VTA projects to the nucleus accumbens (thought to be the reward center). The neurotransmitter most commonly linked with the mesolimbic system is dopamine. Many people consider dopamine to be the driving force behind the human pursuit of pleasure. The release of dopamine is a pleasurable sensation. The release of dopamine motivates us to repeat behaviors or activities that prompted this release. This system’s purpose was to promote survival by rewarding life sustaining behaviors such eating and procreation.

All addictive drugs and activities release varying amounts of dopamine into the nucleus accumbens with stimulant drugs like cocaine and methamphetamine releasing the most. However when it comes to drugs like alcohol or heroin, the brain’s own opiate system (endorphins) also gets involved. Doctor Akoury further says that even though different forms of addictions have different effects in the nucleus accumbens, they share one common denominator that they all activate the reward system which in turn motivates us to repeat those behaviors, even though they may be harmful. Besides what we have discussed about the concepts of reward, pleasure, and craving together, it is however very important to appreciate that there is a distinction between pleasure-seeking and drug seeking. Note that pleasure-seeking is all about the pleasurable, rewarding aspect of addiction while drug-seeking refer to the craving aspect of addiction. Dopamine may be more involved in drug-seeking (craving) component of addiction. The opiate (endorphin), GABA, or glutamatergic systems may be more involved in pleasure-seeking aspect of addiction too.

Pleasure-seeking and drug-seeking (cravings) are inter-related, yet distinct. Research has established that natural rewards (food, water, sex) typically lessen their influence on the reward system over time. As a behavior occurs more often, dopamine levels tend to decrease in the process. Psychologists call this habituation. This makes sense. Once you’ve eaten enough food, you don’t need to be rewarded for eating more food. Then you would be eating too much, or too much of one type of food. Therefore everyone needs to take heed of keeping the brain free from all attacks be it from substances or otherwise. Talking to the experts at AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center under the able leadership of doctor Dalal Akoury should be your starting point. Call and make that appointment today for the commencement of your journey to full recovery from your addiction.

Mesolimbic pathway and drug seeking: Drug cravings to the brain

http://www.awaremednetwork.com/

 

 

 

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sex addiction

Brain hypothalamus area and stress

September 30, 2016
Brain hypothalamus area

Brain hypothalamus area and stress. When the brain needs to be protected the most

Brain hypothalamus area and stress: Regulating stress and withdrawal

One of the areas of the brain that can easily be affected by effects of substance abuse is the brain hypothalamus area. This is the part of the brain that is responsible for several duties including controlling of the body temperature, hunger, thirst, and sleep. Owing to these functions, the hypothalamus is equally playing a key role in how we respond to stress. According to the experts at AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center which is one of the leading pioneers in natural and holistic addiction treatment, we cannot effectively talk about addiction without the mention one stress. Doctor Dalal Akoury MD and also the founder of this facility agree that stress regulation is highly relevant to our understanding of addiction. And that is why we want to explore further into details the effects of addiction on the brain hypothalamus area even as we also look the stress regulation and withdrawal.

Because of that, it is important to note that when an individual experiences stress, the hypothalamus releases chemicals known as hormones. It is these hormones that allows’ the brain and the body to respond to that stress. Unlike neurotransmitters (which are chemicals limited to the brain) hormones travel throughout the body via the blood system. It therefore means that hormones can exert an effect on other body systems as well. When these chemical hormones operate in the brain, we refer to them as neuromodulators. These hormones (neuromodulators) can act just like neurotransmitters in the brain. Like neurotransmitters, they have their own receptors associated with them.

Brain hypothalamus area and stress: How stress motives relapse

From our studies, it is obvious that stress is a well-known relapse trigger to all users of drugs. It capable of prompt powerful cravings in addicted persons I can therefore say almost with certainty that majority of us in one way or another have come across someone who struggled with an addiction and tried to quitting but ultimately relapsed when they became stressed out. Doctor Akoury says that under normal circumstances, at the beginning periods of recovery withdrawal symptoms often create stress and the vicious cycle continues. It is however very important to appreciate that stress will always prompts the addictive use, while efforts to discontinue use prompt stress. During withdrawal, these stress hormones are elevated. Even though stress levels are high, the brain’s anti-stress neuromodulators appear to decrease, as do dopamine and serotonin in the nucleus accumbens. This suggests that withdrawal affected the reward system (evidenced by decreasing dopamine and serotonin). At the same time, withdrawal activates the stress and anxiety systems. This “1-2 punch” heightens the negative experience of withdrawal. This prompts people to seek relief via the addictive substance or activity (i.e., relapse).

In summary, the neurotransmitter pathways associated with the amygdala and the hypothalamus play a crucial role in sustaining the addiction process and this occurs thorough:

  • The negative emotional memory that is associated with drug withdrawal
  • The positive emotional memory that is associated with drug cues
  • The disruption that occurs to stress regulation
  • The pleasurable relief from withdrawal symptoms that occurs by resuming drug use or addictive activities

Finally, since we cannot talk about addiction without mentioning stress, it becomes important that the two need to be addressed professionally and that is where doctor Dalal Akoury and her team of experts from AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center comes in. if you are struggling with this, you can schedule for an appointment today with doctor Akoury for the commencement of your treatment.

Brain hypothalamus area and stress: Regulating stress and withdrawal

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