The Addictiveness of Cocaine Family of Drugs

May 11, 2015

The Addictiveness of Cocaine Family of Drugs: Cola Plant Being the Source

The Addictiveness of Cocaine Family of Drugs offers the greatest threat of life

If you have been with us on this link for sometimes now, you must be aware that, the families of cocaine drugs are some of the most addictive substance in the world. These drugs are very dangerous both to the patients and even to their loved ones. That danger is not doing the economies of the world any justice and that is why we want to enter into this discussion of the addictiveness of cocaine family of drugs in our families, neighborhoods and the general societies at large. In our previous articles doctor Dalal Akoury took us through the origin of cocaine, and just a brief recoup, she mentioned that cocaine is a white powder refined from the coca plant which grows mainly in South America and the Asian continent.

Experts at AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center under the able leadership of doctor Dalal Akoury indicates that users of this drug have a common characteristic on how they administer cocaine into their systems. Under normal circumstances, it is usually spread on a smooth surface such as glass and cut up with a razor blade to form a thin lines or trails which can then be sniffed up through a makeshift straw such as a banknote. Snorting is actually one of the most common forms of consumption although there are some other ways too like injection and smoking. It is easily absorbed through the lining of the nose. However if this method is used repeated (snorting), a lot of damages can be caused on the membranes of the nose which may also perforate the nasal septum which is the barrier separating one side of the nose and the other. These damages can be avoided only if you chose to do the right thing. Like for instance scheduling for an appointment with doctor Akoury will be a step in the right direction for your full recovery.

Cocaine and crack speed up the body in a similar way to amphetamines, but the effect is shorter and more intense – less than an hour for cocaine and as short as several minutes for crack. As with amphetamines, cocaine releases an intense rush of energy, makes a person feel good, mentally sharp, talkative and confident. When blood levels begin to dive, the craving is often overwhelming to take more. And just like with all drugs and life experiences, the greater the high, the worse the fall.

The early euphoric experience disappears in heavy users, who can feel very restless, with nausea, excitability, extreme agitation, anxiety, and paranoia and possible hallucinations. It is important to note that very high doses can rarely cause heart failure, convulsions and death. Regular cocaine users often have interrupted sleep patterns. They feel unable to cope until they’ve had some Charlie, stressed-out and irritable. Life for weekend users can become a process of trying to get through the week until Friday. Regular users may feel that they cannot have a “good time” without the drug. Stopping the drug produces terrible headaches, tiredness, nausea, sleepiness and depression.

The Addictiveness of Cocaine Family of Drugs: Crack

Free basing (smoking) is done by mixing cocaine with other substances and sodium hydroxide. The salt base then dissolves leaving granules of pure cocaine which can be smoked in a pipe. The vapors in the lung hit the brain in eight seconds, producing a massive high which only lasts for ten minutes, after which the desire to have more is experienced and that is why people become very much addicted to these substances. Besides that cocaine and crack can also be used during sex to prolong sex in a man by acting as a local anesthetic on the genitalia.

The other problem with these drugs is that which directly affects the unborn babies commonly known as crack babies. This has been a great concern in most nations like in the US for example; a study conducted by NIDA established that up to 200,000 of substance abuse in pregnancy is crack or cocaine. Doctor Akoury reiterates that the effect on babies can be very fatal. Some of the known risk may include: premature labour, stillbirth, low birth weight, ectopic pregnancy, sudden infant death and small size at birth. Now the fatality of these drugs can affect the babies for life, like for instance such children may have permanent mental damage from the effects of what happened to them while in the womb. It must also be known that cocaine and alcohol can be a very hazardous combination since the human liver combines coca and alcohol metabolites to form new cocktails which are toxic.

The Addictiveness of Cocaine Family of Drugs: Crack related violence

In terms of reputation crack has nothing to be admired since it has all along been associated with extreme violence due to the obvious reasons like for instance, cocaine is highly addictive and the habit is expensive so large amounts of money are needed to keep a user happy and stakes are high for people seeking to control a distribution network area. The drug itself can cause anxiety, fear and paranoia, and when knives or guns are around, murder can easily be the result.

The Addictiveness of Cocaine Family of Drugs: Crack rehabilitation

This is one thing that has been very difficult and challenging. Crack addiction can be very hard in the sense that even attracting users into treatment programs can be a real challenge. Cocaine users are often very different culturally from heroin users and often prefer to keep well apart. Crack clients can be far more aggressive and instantly demanding than heroin users, and many drugs services find it hard to respond. Crack users are not offered substitute medication the equivalent to methadone for heroin users. Many crack users are black and feel uncomfortable in a white dominated support center. Finally, paranoia itself can fuel natural suspicions of authority.

So then, crack and cocaine are real threats even if their use is more limited than some feared it would be. Fashions in drug culture come and go. Expect further surges in crack consumption in particular groups over the next couple of decades with decline in others. Each wave of experimentation leaves a hard core of chronic addicts. They are a small minority of those who have ever used the drug but are a large part of the market.

The Addictiveness of Cocaine Family of Drugs: Cola Plant Being the Source

Cocaine and Stimulant Induced Skin Picking

May 7, 2015

Cocaine and Stimulant Induced Skin Picking: Why you must consider quitting

Cocaine and Stimulant Induced Skin Picking and this is not working for the beauty of your skin at all.

For quite sometimes now we have been addressing the issues surrounding substance abuse. We have dealt with various effects of drugs and so far we are not seeing anything good about drugs. And what is worrying is that even though this piece of information is now consumable by many people, drug related conditions are still on the rise. One of the most disturbing conditions is the way cocaine is rearranging peoples’ faces and transforming their lives negatively. Even though this is very evident and the victims themselves can see for themselves the damage caused by cocaine addiction on the mirror, they are still very much hooked into their addiction. This is what we have been addressing and for the purpose of this article, we are going to focus on beauty and how cocaine and stimulant induced skin picking. Before we settle into the discussion, I want to share with you an experience one of the patients went through and this is also a representation of what many addicts are also going through.

For the purposes of confidentiality I will refer to the patient as GK. After abusing cocaine for some time, one day he stood before his mirror and he dint like what he saw. What was before him was an increasingly common and distressing indicator of excessive cocaine and stimulant use. Skin picking was the problem. He spent several hours before the mirror squeezing and tweezing as the smallest of spots becomes a painful wound. Hair pulled out, bugs under the skin, insects or mites in his clothes and house. We are going to rely on GK experience to shed some light on this extremely upsetting, hidden behavior, examining the chemistry behind it, why it happens and the role cocaine and other stimulants have to play. This is a discussion you don’t want to miss but in the meantime you can schedule for an appointment with doctor Dalal Akoury the MD and founder of AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center. She will be of greater help to you in all matters relating to addiction and beauty. And now back to the discussion of Cocaine and stimulant induced skin picking…

Cocaine and Stimulant Induced Skin Picking: Skin Picking
Skin picking due to excessive crack cocaine use has become more common as more people use crack disorderly and because of this there is sudden increase in negative health issues linked to this habit. Professionally in the medical understanding skin picking is seen as a compulsive foraging response (CICF – ‘cocaine induced compulsive foraging’) but the compulsion to skin pick has also been called psychogenic excoriation, delusional parasitosis, self-inflicted dermatoses, dermatillomania, formication, or hypoesthesia; which is quite surprising considering that there has been so little research on the subject.

The features of skin picking may include excessive scratching, picking, gouging, lancing, digging and squeezing of normal or slightly marred skin. Even though the whole body can be involved, commonly the most picked areas include; fingernails, face, lips, scalp, arms and legs. This is made possible because drugs like cocaine, methylephenidate, phenelzine amphetamine and anticholinergic drugs often produce increased nerve activity tactile sensations like burning, tingling and crawling (worms under the skin) that can lead to skin picking. So while it is clearly a chemical reaction to the drugs you’re taking, it can be closely linked with psychological issues such as extreme anxiety or childhood trauma. So why do some people skin pick excessively, where others don’t?
Studies suggest that it’s a coping mechanism for dealing with emotional pain. Physical pain distracts the individual and can help to alleviate feelings of guilt through self-punishment. Many S-P’s (skin pickers) report increased levels of tension prior to skin picking and a sense of relief or satisfaction following the picking. Some experience an altered state of consciousness whilst picking resembling a dissocialized state. However, lack of pain during picking episodes may also be related to opioid dysregulation. We can see elevated levels of B-endorphin in S-Ps, because pain, in this case through self-injurious behavior, leads to the release of B-endorphins, which in turn leads to the release of tension.

Victims of childhood abuse often have elevated levels of B-endorphins too, in their CSF (cerebrospinal fluid) in the brain, because of repeated exposure to pain, or from being prohibited to reacting to the infliction of pain. Women with a history of childhood abuse also exhibit increased pituitary adrenaline and automatic heart rate responses to stress. So in many cases, skin picking is a chemical reaction that has been built up from past trauma, where a person’s elevated b-endorphins or ACTH response is reacting with the drug they’re taking: crack cocaine.

Cocaine increases the activity of dopamine, a neurotransmitter in the automatic nervous system associated with pleasure which is important for reinforcement of behaviour.However, for reasons we don’t have the space to go into, too much use of cocaine can lead to a lack of dopamine in your system, which in turn leads to mood and anxiety disorders.

S-Ps often suffers from one or more of the following conditions:

Major depression
Bipolar disorder (manic depression)
Dysthymia (depression tendencies)
Panic attacks
Agoraphobia
Post-traumatic stress
Obsessive compulsive disorder
Eating disorders
Trichotillomania (hair /eyelash/body hair pulling)
Kleptomania (compulsive stealing of objects) and
Body dysmorphic disorder (hated self-image).

Beside the mention conditions, some studies have also established that more than half of the individuals with serious skin picking conditions also reported a history of body rocking, thumb sucking, knuckle cracking, cheek chewing and head banging. Along-side with all these, skin picking also causes a lot of anguish. Like for instance, the victim can feel embarrassed and this may lead to shame and even impaired social functioning and in some cases people withdraw altogether from social activities and confine themselves to their home. Some people also experience medical complications as a result of skin picking, like ulcers, infections, permanent discoloration and scarring. Remember that too much scratching leads to open wounds and sores and when this is combined with injecting, infection can travel from the skin to the blood, causing serious illnesses such as septicemia or endocarditis.

Cocaine and Stimulant Induced Skin Picking: Cocaine Induced Psychosis & ‘Foraging’

Chronic cocaine or crack use can result in cocaine induced paranoia (CIP) and coke-induced compulsive foraging (CICF) type behaviors. ‘Compulsive foraging’ covers a cluster of cocaine induced behaviors of which skin picking is just one. Another ‘foraging disorder’ is when coke users hunt for hours for specs of cocaine around a place where it was once used (also called ‘surfing’). Food deprivation or hunger increases the probability of foraging responses and because it’s an appetite suppressant, coke can make users vulnerable to malnutrition thus continuing foraging behavior. Skin picking is a foraging response.

Cocaine and Stimulant Induced Skin Picking: Why you must consider quitting

How cocaine can destroy your body parts

May 6, 2015

How cocaine can destroy your body parts: What you need to know about Cocaine

How cocaine can destroy your body parts. this crystal dust is no respecter of anyone. Seek for help immediately and be safe

Of all substance of abuse cocaine abuse is the fastest growing drug problem among the middle classes communities. According to a report released by a Police Foundation recently it was stated that there are 120,000 regular users and 360,000 occasional users of cocaine, with 180,000 taking crack cocaine the report concludes. This drug is no respecter of any one and social status is not a factor when it comes to drug addiction. Everyone is vulnerable and we must face the problem boldly without fear. Doctor Akoury is taking the initiative to help you get the best of your life in this article by focusing on the discussion topic which is “how cocaine can destroy your body parts. The chilling revelations doctor Akoury is about to share with us are just but a very small portion of what this drug is capable of doing in your life. It would be appropriate that even as you go through this article, you may want to schedule for an appointment with the experts at AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center, a health facility founded by doctor Akoury to give her contribution towards eliminating cocaine addiction and other addictive elements. Let us now get to the business of understanding the impact of cocaine in human health.

How cocaine can destroy your body parts: Mental problems

Although cocaine is used because it causes excitement, those addicts who use this drug regularly in high doses can develop short-term sessions of uncontrolled behavior, impaired judgment, impulsive behavior and hyper-sexuality. Besides that, other users are also likely to develop persecutory delusions and hallucinations which often cause them problems with the authorities. When addicts use this drug, it causes them to lose sense of control and occasionally become violent. Yet alongside that muscle twitching and convulsions (fits) are also a risk with heavy use, more so in adolescents who smoke crack, a pure and highly addictive form of the drug. Coma, breakdown of muscles and kidney failure can also occur.

How cocaine can destroy your body parts: Liver

Users of cocaine often combine it with alcohol to deliver more excitement. To them this combination gives them the feeling of the ‘high’ to satisfaction as opposed to when cocaine is used on its own. With this combination, the effect of cocaine is given a boost and the reason behind it is that a new chemical is formed in the liver which has similar effects to cocaine but which last longer in the body. Doctor Akoury sounds a warning that this practice is chillingly dangerous. It is highly associated with liver damages and risk of premature death is 18 times greater with this combination.

How cocaine can destroy your body parts: Chest pain

One of the most common reasons for requiring emergency treatment is the enormous tightening of blood vessels, in the coronary arteries and the rest of the body. Cocaine deprives the heart of its normal blood supply, increasing the risk of a heart attack or a heart rhythm disturbance which might cause the user to drop dead suddenly. The shape of the pattern on the electrocardiogram (heart trace) can look worrying to the doctor, especially as it can change from minute to minute. But in most cases it settles down and no major harm results.

How cocaine can destroy your body parts: Blood pressure

Cocaine releases massive amounts of noradrenaline from the nerve endings, which causes blood vessels right through the body to narrow. This leads to a major surge in blood pressure. To the onlooker, the user looks pale and staring, but there may be no other outward signs of the enormous rise in blood pressure. However the rise in blood pressure is not permanent, but may still cause a heart attack or stroke and repeated use causes long-term damage to the blood vessels.

Blood vessels

One of the most vulnerable organs from the abuse of cocaine is the heart aorta which is the main blood vessel in the body. A surge in blood pressure following cocaine use forces the blood between the inner and outer casings of the aorta and each time the heart pumps this false passage becomes longer and more liable to block off a branch vessel or to burst, with possibility of fatal results.

Brain

Regular cocaine use can lead to a bulging weakness in the wall of a branch point of the arteries in the brain. This is often called a berry aneurysm. Eventually this aneurysm bursts, and blood pouring out of the leak is known as a subarachnoid hemorrhage. If not corrected, it can cause major damage to the brain. This damage can be permanent leading to difficulties in thought, speech, sight and movement.

How cocaine can destroy your body parts: Nose

Cocaine powder is ‘snorted’ into the nostrils, and although it is rapidly absorbed into the bloodstream, the drug also causes the blood vessels in the lining of the nose passages to shrink. Shortly after use, the blood vessels widen again, and the red, runny stuffed-up nose of the recent user can be a telltale sign. Repeated cocaine use leads to loss of blood supply to the septum that is the thin bony element dividing wall between the nostrils. This will cause damage to the nose leaving a hole in between the two nose passages. The consequence of this may be the collapse of the nose.

Heart

Consistent use of cocaine causes massive stresses and strains on the blood vessels in the coronary arteries and the rest of the body. This leads to a build- up of cholesterol in the walls of arteries, especially the coronary arteries. A regular cocaine user aged 30 might have blood vessels as old as one at 60-year-old. This may lead to a sudden and unexpected heart attack in a long-term user.

Skin

During treatment and the recovery process, some people may experience some unfriendly crawling feelings beneath the skin as they are withdrawing from cocaine. They may describe cocaine bugs as biting, creeping, burning or itching, and may scratch their skin until it bleeds. Although this sensation can be treated to some extent by tranquillizer type drugs, in most cases the user has to wait until it settles down and goes away of its own accord. Finally cocaine is not any drug you would want to flow in your system. It is highly addictive and life threatening. If you are struggling with this drug, you may have noticed that from this article, very vital organs of the body are all affected by this drug. Your health cannot be compared with anything. You must make a U turn to redeem your life back. Doctor Dalal Akoury will help in every step of the way. All you need to do is to schedule for an appointment with her today.

How cocaine can destroy your body parts: What you need to know about Cocaine

Cocaine and Crack Abuse are great Threats

May 6, 2015

Cocaine and Crack Abuse are great Threats: The Dangers it brings on your Health

Cocaine and Crack Abuse are great Threats. It can be administered to the body either through injection, snorting or smoking.

The history of cocaine is well known and how it affects the good health of our societies. Cocaine is a very powerful addictive stimulant drug that when allowed to settle in anyone’s life, then devastations and frustrations will follow as the immediate consequences. Whichever way you look at it, cocaine is not good. No single advantage can be attached to this drug. As a matter of fact cocaine and crack abuse are great threats of life. The powdered hydrochloride salt form of cocaine can be snorted or injected as a solution of water. And when we talk of crack cocaine, it means that, this cocaine base has not been neutralized by an acid to transform it into a hydrochloride salt. When that is done, this form of cocaine comes in a rock crystal which can be heated to produce vapors, a product which can be smoked. The term “crack” therefore refers to the crackling sound produced by the rock as it is heated.

Cocaine and Crack Abuse are great Threats: How is Cocaine Abused?

According to the experts at AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center, cocaine abuse is in most cases considered in relation to the mode of its administration. There are three main routes that are commonly used and they may include the following:

Snorting – this is the process of inhaling cocaine powder through the nose, where it is absorbed into the bloodstream through the nasal tissues.
Injection – in this case cocaine in mixed with water and the solution is then injected into the body using the needle to release the drug directly into the blood streams.
Smoking – this involves inhaling cocaine vapor or smoke into the lungs, where absorption into the bloodstream is as rapid as by injection.

Irrespective of which method you choose, the dangers remain the same and in all the methods of administration can lead to addiction and other chronic and severe health problems, including increasing the risk of contracting HIV and infectious diseases says doctor Akoury MD and also the founder of AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center.

The intensity and duration of cocaine’s effects, which include increased energy, reduced fatigue, and mental alertness, depend on the route of drug administration.
The faster cocaine is absorbed into the bloodstream and delivered to the brain, the more intense the high.
Injecting or smoking cocaine produces a quicker, stronger high than snorting.
On the other hand, faster absorption usually means shorter duration of action.
The high from snorting cocaine may last 15 to 30 minutes, but the high from smoking may last only 5 to 10 minutes.

In order to sustain the high, a cocaine abuser has to administer the drug again. For this reason, cocaine is sometimes abused in binges taken repeatedly within a relatively short period of time, at increasingly high doses.

Cocaine and Crack Abuse are great Threats: Effects of Cocaine to the Brain

Without missing the words, cocaine is a strong central nervous system stimulant that raises the levels of dopamine. This is a brain chemical which is associated with pleasure and movement, in the brain’s reward circuit. And because dopamine facilitates communication in some brain cell commonly known as neurons, therefore dopamine is released by neurons to respond to signals like the smell or taste of good food and then it is recycled back into the cell that releases it which in return will shut off the signal between neurons.

Cocaine acts by preventing the dopamine from being recycled, causing excessive amounts of dopamine to build up, amplifying the message, and ultimately disrupting normal communication. It is this excess of dopamine that is responsible for cocaine’s euphoric effects. With repeated use, cocaine can cause long-term changes in the brain’s reward system and in other brain systems as well, which may eventually lead to addiction. Further to this with repeated use, tolerance to the cocaine high also often develops. This has been confirmed from various reports that many cocaine addicts often seek to get high by consuming more but they fail to achieve as much pleasure as they use to from their first exposure. This means that some users choose to increase their dose in an attempt to intensify and prolong the euphoria, but this can also increase the risk of adverse psychological or physiological effects.

Cocaine and Crack Abuse are great Threats: The Adverse Effects of Cocaine on Health

There is no doubt that cocaine abuse impact on health negatively, like for instance:

Cocaine compresses blood vessels
Dilates eye pupils
Increases body temperature
Heart rate
Blood pressure

It can also cause headaches and gastrointestinal complications such as abdominal pain and nausea. And because cocaine tends to decrease appetite, chronic users can become malnourished as well.

Cocaine and Crack Abuse are great Threats: Effects based on the mode of administration

Like I had indicated before that, cocaine is administered in to the body primarily in there different ways. These methods of taking cocaine can produce different adverse effects. like for instance:

Regularly snorting cocaine, for example, can lead to loss of the sense of smell, nosebleeds, problems with swallowing, hoarseness, and a chronically runny nose.
Ingesting cocaine can cause severe bowel gangrene as a result of reduced blood flow.
Injecting cocaine can bring about severe allergic reactions and increased risk for contracting HIV and other blood-borne diseases.
Binge patterns of use may lead to irritability, restlessness, anxiety, and paranoia.
Cocaine abusers can suffer a temporary state of full-blown paranoid psychosis, in which they lose touch with reality and experience auditory hallucinations.

Doctor Akoury emphases that it doesn’t matter how it is administered or how frequently cocaine is used, in all these users can experience acute cardiovascular or cere-brovascular emergencies, such as a heart attack or stroke, which may cause sudden death. Remember that most cocaine-related deaths are often as result of cardiac arrest or seizure followed by respiratory arrest. All these can be brought to manageable levels if we all pool together and begin doing the right things. You may not know conclusively what to do and that is why doctor Akoury founder this health facility to help you stay healthy. You can schedule for an appointment with doctor Dalal Akoury and together with her team of experts they will professionally offer lasting solution to your individual conditions.

Cocaine and Crack Abuse are great Threats: The Dangers it brings on your Health

The inversion of Cocaine in your brain

May 4, 2015

The inversion of Cocaine in your brain: Effects of Cocaine in the Nerve system

The inversion of Cocaine in your brain. Cocaine has an extremely rapid euphoric effect on the user, especially when smoked or snorted.

Cocaine is very addictive and a psychoactive drug affecting the central nervous system primarily. Originally it is prepared from the leaf of the Erythroxylon coca bush, which grows mainly in Peru and Bolivia. The simplicity of its usage has made the inversion of cocaine in your brain more chronic and threatening. As a matter of facts this drug is self-administered in several ways explains doctor Dalal Akoury. The most common method of cocaine abuse is snorting in its powder form into the nasal sinuses, either alone or with the accompaniment of heroin (speedball). This drug is easily available in the streets as a hydrochloride salt which is a fine, white crystalline powder known in several street manes as coke, C, snow, flake, or blow. Besides snorting, the drug can also be administered through smoking which for many is effective in producing quick result as crack cocaine.

According to the experts at AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center, cocaine produces a wide range of physiological effects in humans, including the stimulation of a plethora of emotional experiences. When people take in cocaine, they become euphoric, over exited, highly active and more talkative than normal. When they use this drug, they experience the feelings of extreme power and alertness. This initial high is followed by sessions of severe anxiety, paranoia, and depression, which often lead to addiction. Those who become addicted to the drug often turn the habit into an obsession, so that they devote more, and more of their time and money to acquiring and using the drug explains doctor Akoury. Therefore what are some of the notable symptoms of addiction for users?

The inversion of Cocaine in your brain: Symptoms of addiction

People who abuse these drugs regularly often exhibit psychotic behavior such as:

Hallucinations
Delusions of persecution
Mood disturbances
Repetitive behaviors

All these closely resemble the symptoms of paranoid schizophrenia. Trained mental health professionals have difficulties in telling a schizophrenic and cocaine addict apart unless they know the patient’s background. Although the psychological and behavioral effects of cocaine use in humans have been well documented, the current knowledge of the neurological basis for the abuse of cocaine in humans is still limited. The majority of knowledge we possess about the mechanisms of the effects of cocaine comes from animal studies performed over the last 20 years. These studies have clearly demonstrated the crucial role of the neurotransmitter dopamine in initiating many of the effects of cocaine use.

The inversion of Cocaine in your brain: Effects on the brain

Cocaine is an indirect dopamine agonist. Once in the brain, it works in large part by occupying, or blocking, dopamine transporter sites in the terminal buttons of neurons in the brain. This prevents the reuptake of dopamine by the neurons that release it, allowing higher concentrations of dopamine to remain in the synapse for an extended period of time. This abnormally long presence, and high concentration, of dopamine in the synapse is believed to cause the high associated with cocaine use. Dopamine has been implicated in several important functions, including movement, attention, learning, and the reinforcing effects of drug use. Therefore, its extended presence in high concentrations will be effective in the particular parts of the brain that control these functions, such as the basal ganglia and the limbic system.

The inversion of Cocaine in your brain: Cocaine and the dopamine transporter

Studies have confirmed that the reinforcing effects of cocaine involve dopamine transporter molecules. In a dopamine study, a group of scientists produced a targeted mutation of the gene responsible for production of the dopamine transporter protein in mice. In their findings, it was established that several compensatory mechanisms in an animal’s brain help it to adapt to the chronically higher level of dopamine resulting from their mutation induced reuptake inability. One of these mechanisms is a large decrease in post-synaptic dopamine receptors, rendering dopamine less effective. Another strategy is a corresponding decrease in the concentration of tyrosine hydroxylase (enzyme responsible for the synthesis of dopamine), decreasing the availability of dopamine. So, when cocaine was administered to these animals, it had no effect on the animal’s behavior since dopamine reuptake no longer occurred due to lack of functional dopamine transporters. This therefore is a demonstration that the dopamine transporter is essential for cocaine to be able to produce its effects.

The inversion of Cocaine in your brain: A quick fix

Cocaine has an extremely rapid euphoric effect on the user, especially in the case of the smoking method of use, because the drug directly enters the pulmonary blood stream when smoked. Cocaine has a relatively short half-life in the plasma and in the brain. When administered intravenously (IV) to humans, the half-life is in the range of 16 to 87 minutes. This short half-life accounts for the rapid euphoric effects of the drug. Typically, when the drug is administered intravenously, it produces a fast “hit-and-run” effect on the potentiation of the extracellular levels of dopamine. Nonetheless when rats are given a continuous flow of dopamine intravenously, they experience a peak in dopamine levels in just 10 minutes followed by a return to regular levels after 20 to 30 minutes. Because the initial high experienced by cocaine abusers lasts for only a short time, the initial stimulatory actions of cocaine can be attributed to the elevation of synaptic dopamine levels.

Finally the use of drugs not necessarily cocaine is not your portion. Nothing actually comes good out of the use or abuse of drugs in whichever way you look at it. Being safe and free from drugs is the best thing you can do for yourself especially if you are already deeply addicted to it. There is help around you and doctor Dalal Akoury made one of the best decisions to give her professional contribution in helping the struggling societies with addiction. She decided 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. You can also be part of this by scheduling for an appointment with her today and your life will be completely transformed for greater productivity ahead of you. Remember that doctor Akoury’s practice focuses on personalized medicine through healthy lifestyle choices that deal with primary prevention and underlying causes instead of patching up symptoms and this will be very good for you too.

The inversion of Cocaine in your brain: Effects of Cocaine in the Nerve system

Tag Archives: Cocaine