Various health complications of Heroin abuse

June 5, 2015

Various health complications of Heroin abuse: Short and long term effects

Various health complications of Heroin abuse can be corrected if treatment is sought in good time

While looking at the elaborate information about heroin addiction in our previous article, we noted that various studies have established the undoubted prevalence of heroin addiction in this generation. Doctor Akoury establishment of AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center has been taking the lead role in creating awareness about the scourge of addiction and most importantly offering lasting solutions to the victims. This is the spirit that every other organization should have and meticulously implement for us to have a vibrant healthy and economically productive society. Because of the addictiveness nature of heroin, the various health complications of heroin abuse are very indiscriminative and everybody is vulnerable in equal measures. With the help of professionals from AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center under the able leadership of doctor Dalal Akoury, we are going to explore with a view of understanding some of the effects of heroin abuse in our health.

As we had mentioned before that there are three major means of administration of heroin into the body with injection being the most predominant, it has also been established that soon after injection or inhalation and heroin crosses the blood brain barrier. And while in the brain, heroin is converted to morphine and binds rapidly to opioid receptors. With these done abusers will typically report feeling a surge of pleasurable sensation, a “rush” which now brings us to the understanding of some of the short term effects of heroin abuse.

Various health complications of Heroin abuse: Short-term effects of heroin abuse

“Rush”
Depressed respiration
Clouded mental functioning
Nausea and vomiting
Suppression of pain
Spontaneous abortion

The intensity of the rush is a function of how much drug is taken and how rapidly the drug enters the brain and binds to the natural opioid receptors. It is important to note that heroin is particularly addictive because it enters the brain so quickly. With heroin, the rush is usually accompanied by a warm flushing of the skin, dry mouth, and a heavy feeling in the extremities, which may be accompanied by nausea, vomiting, and severe itching. Doctor Akoury further explains that after the initial effects, abusers usually will be drowsy for several hours. Mental function is clouded by heroin’s effect on the central nervous system. Cardiac functions slow. Breathing is also severely slowed, sometimes to the point of death. Heroin overdose is a particular risk on the street, where the amount and purity of the drug cannot be accurately known.

Various health complications of Heroin abuse: What are the long-term effects of heroin use?

One of the most detrimental long-term effects of heroin is addiction itself which is a chronic, relapsing disease, characterized by compulsive drug seeking and use, and by neurochemical and molecular changes in the brain. Heroin also produces profound degrees of tolerance and physical dependence, which are also powerful motivating factors for compulsive use and abuse. Other long-term effects of heroin abuse may include the following:

Addiction
Infectious diseases like HIV/AIDS and hepatitis B and C
Collapsed veins
Bacterial infections
Abscesses
Infection of heart lining and valves
Arthritis and other rheumatologic problems

The common denominator with all addictive drugs is that their users will become their prisoners. In the same way heroin abusers will by and by spend more of their time, energy and resources in obtaining and using the drug. And once addicted and are now prisoners of drugs, their primary purpose in life will be to seek for the drug and use it disorderly thereby making very significant changes in their brains. Besides that as they continue abusing the drug, physical dependence develops with higher doses of the same. This will then cause the body to adapt to the presence of the drug and withdrawal symptoms occurring should the drug use be stopped abruptly. When we talk about withdrawal, it is important to note that this can take place even within few hours from the last usage. The following are some of the symptoms of withdrawal restlessness, muscle and bone pain, insomnia, diarrhea, vomiting, cold sweats with goose bumps (“cold turkey”), and leg movements. Major withdrawal symptoms peak between 24 and 48 hours after the last dose of heroin and subside after about a week. However, some people have shown persistent withdrawal signs for many months. And even though heroin withdrawal may never be fatal to healthy adults, this may not be so with unborn children in the womb, it can cause death to the fetus of a pregnant addict.

When using heroin, it is important to note that the continued use of this substance may lead to the user being addicted to it. And this happens; many addicts will have to endure many of the withdrawal symptoms to reduce their tolerance for the drug so that they can again experience the rush. In the past explains doctor Akoury, physical dependence and emergence of withdrawal symptoms were believed to be the key features of heroin addiction. However studies have revealed that this may not be the case entirely, since craving and relapse can also occur weeks and months after withdrawal symptoms are long gone. We also know that patients with chronic pain who need opiates to function (sometimes over extended periods) have few if any problems leaving opiates after their pain is resolved by other means. This may be because the patient in pain is simply seeking relief of pain and not the rush sought by the addict.

Various health complications of Heroin abuse: What are the medical complications of chronic heroin abuse?

Finally medical consequences of chronic heroin abuse include scarred or collapsed veins, bacterial infections of the blood vessels and heart valves, abscesses (boils) and other soft-tissue infections, and liver or kidney disease. Lung complications (including various types of pneumonia and tuberculosis) may result from the poor health condition of the abuser as well as from heroin’s depressing effects on respiration. Many of the additives in street heroin may include substances that do not readily dissolve and result in clogging the blood vessels that lead to the lungs, liver, kidneys and the brain. This can cause infection or even death of small patches of cells in vital organs. Immune reactions to these or other contaminants can cause arthritis or other rheumatologic problems. And of course, sharing of injection equipment or fluids can lead to some of the most severe consequences of heroin abuse – infections with hepatitis B and C, HIV, and a host of other blood-borne viruses, which drug abusers can then pass on to their sexual partners and children. With these explanations, it is only prudent that if you are struggling with heroin addiction, then you need to seek for immediate treatment which can be done professionally if you schedule for an appointment with doctor Dalal Akoury MD and founder of AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center. Up on receipt of your request they will slot you in for treatment and help you all the way to reclaim your life back professionally and confidentially.

Various health complications of Heroin abuse: Short and long term effects

Elaborate information about Heroin addiction

June 5, 2015

Elaborate information about Heroin addiction: What is heroin?

Elaborate information about Heroin addiction is very necessary for the proper administration of treatment

Have you ever imagine life free of any kind of substance abuse? The benefits of that will be overwhelmingly very healthy and productive. That is the kind of life that we are championing for you and your family as experts from AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center under the able leadership of doctor Dalal Akoury who is also the founder of the facility. In her over two decades of practice in medicine and in matters addiction in particular, doctor Akoury has over the years been a champion of addiction solutions to many victims globally. She says that for anyone to effectively deal with drug addiction, every individual needs to be well equipped with elaborate information about heroin addiction and all other substance of abuse including alcohol miss use. Because many people are suffering because of lack of knowledge doctor Akoury founded this facility and she has been using it as a plat form of creating awareness to the societies on matters relating to the protection of their health. In this article, our focus is going to be on the elaborate information about heroin addiction. Therefore what is this drug heroin?

In simple terms, heroin is an illegal and highly addictive drug. It is one of the most abused and also most rapidly acting of the opiates. Heroin is typically sold as a white or brownish powder or as the black sticky substance known on the streets as “black tar heroin.” Doctor Akoury says that although these days purer heroin is becoming more common, most street heroin is “cut” with other drugs or with substances such as sugar, starch, powdered milk, or quinine. Street heroin can also be cut with strychnine or other poisons. Because heroin abusers do not know the actual strength of the drug or its true contents, they are at risk of overdose or death. Heroin also poses special problems because of the transmission of HIV and other diseases that can occur from sharing needles or other injection equipment.

It is believed that originally heroin is processed from morphine, a naturally occurring substance extracted from the seed pod of the Asian poppy plant. Heroin usually appears as a white or brown powder and it is associated with several street names including “smack”, “H”, “skag”, and “junk”. Other names may refer to types of heroin produced in a specific geographical area, such as “Mexican black tar”.

Elaborate information about Heroin addiction: What is the Scope of Heroin use in our societies?

The available statistics is worrying and according to the 1996 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse, which may actually underestimate illicit opiate (heroin) use, an estimated 2.4 million people use heroin at some time in their lives, and nearly 216,000 of them reported using it within the month preceding the survey. The survey report estimates that there were 141,000 new heroin users about two decades ago and that there has been an increasing trend in new heroin use since that time. A large proportion of these new users were smoking, snorting, or sniffing heroin with majority of them being under the age of 26. The report also indicated that the estimates of use for other age groups also increased, particularly among youths age 12 to 17 and the incidence of first-time heroin users among this age group also increased fourfold subsequently from the 1980s to 1995.

Yet in another study the 1996 Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN), which collected data on drug- related hospital emergency department (ED) episodes from 21 metropolitan areas, estimates that 14 percent of all drug-related ED episodes involved heroin. Even more alarming was the fact that between 1988 and 1994, heroin-related ED episodes increased by 64 percent that is from 39,063 to 64,013.

NIDA’s Community Epidemiology Work Group (CEWG), which provides information about the nature and patterns of drug use in 20 cities, reported in its December 1996 publication that heroin was the primary drug of abuse related to drug abuse treatment admissions in most cities including Newark, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Boston, and it ranked a close second to cocaine in New York and Seattle. These statistics clearly shows that heroin addiction is with us and it is time to step forward progressively to root it out from our systems says doctor Akoury. Before we get into how heroin is used, let us further look at another set of studies conducted by NHSDA for more clarity about heroin abuse.

Elaborate information about Heroin addiction: National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (NHSDA)

The 1996 NHSDA shows a significant increase from 1993 in the estimated number of current (once in the past month) heroin users. The estimates have risen from 68,000 in 1993 to whooping 216,000 in 1996. Among individuals who had ever used heroin in their lives, the proportion that had ever smoked sniffed or snorted heroin increased from 55 percent in 1994 to 82 percent in 1996. During the same period, the proportion of users who injected heroin remained about the same, at about 50 percent. With these data it is evident that the prevalence of heroin addiction cannot be ignored any longer. People are literally suffering both in public and in private and it is now time for action. We have able experts at AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center who are well trained and are of high standards of experience to help you go through this problem of heroin addiction. Take that step of faith right now and schedule for an appointment with doctor Dalal Akoury for the commencement of your addiction recovery treatment.

Elaborate information about Heroin addiction: How is Heroin Used?

Now in conclusion of this article let us consider some of the modes of usage of this drug heroin. There are three major ways of administering heroin which usually include injection, sniffing or snorting or through smoking. Typically, a heroin abuser may inject up to four times a day. Available facts indicate that intravenous injection provides the greatest intensity and most rapid onset of euphoria (7 to 8 seconds), while intramuscular injection produces a relatively slow onset of euphoria (5 to 8 minutes). However when heroin is sniffed or smoked, peak effects are usually felt within 10 to 15 minutes. Although smoking and sniffing of heroin do not produce a “rush” as quickly or as intensely as intravenous injection, NIDA researchers have confirmed that all three forms of heroin administration are addictive.

From our observation at AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center, it is becoming clearer that of the three administration applications, injection continues to be the predominant method of heroin use among addicted users seeking treatment not just from our facility but across the board globally. Nonetheless specific studies have also perceived a shift in heroin use patterns, from injection to sniffing and smoking. In fact, sniffing or snorting heroin is now a widely reported means of taking heroin among users admitted for drug treatment in most rehabilitation centers across the globe. Finally it may not matter which method is commonly used, the bottom line is that people are being addicted to the drug and lasting solution must be sought timely. If you are enclosed in this bracket of suffering, talk to us today and we will be more than willing to help you get your life back.

Elaborate information about Heroin addiction: What is heroin?

Did you contribute to your sons Addiction

May 15, 2015

Did you contribute to your sons Addiction: Is there anything you could have done differently?

Did you contribute to your sons Addiction? trace your actions and mend the ribbon where necessary

The challenges we have in life today causes us to do certain things that under normal circumstances we would have not done. The economic hardship is on such factor that takes all our attention. We are deeply rooted in the business of chasing for contracts, connections and business meetings all in an effort to adding value to our lives and families. I have realized that while doing all these things time is spent and every moment certain activities get the upper hand or the lion’s share of time allocation. This is where in my view the problem begins from. You will agree with me that currently our work takes most of our time in relation to the time we spend with our families. Did that catch your attention? How much time do you take with your family? Are your children able to wish you good night physically or are you wishing them good night on phone? How often do you visit your children in school and follow their academic performance with their teachers or you have found refuge in their teachers to take part some of your responsibilities as you look for money? Is your neighborhood safe for your children like they cannot get bad influence and become liabilities to the society? In this point of time when substance abuse is almost the order of the day do you know your child well? And if your child is already an addict, did you contribute to your son’s addiction? These are very are very pertinent questions which needs to be addressed with great honesty. To help you bring these concerns to perspective, let us listen to one of the client doctor Akoury attended to recently.

Did you contribute to your sons Addiction: What I Wish I Had Done Differently with My Addicted Son?

In my line of duty I attend to very many people from all walks of life but recently I received an e-mail from a concerned parent. In her main she described her son’s addiction very passionately explains doctor Akoury. She spoke about several experiences that I believe are similar to many people today. The mail continues that she was getting worried because she had done all that she though was humanly possible but all yielded very minimal result and now she is worried of losing her son to drug addiction. The question she thrown after all this is what I want to through back to you, so that you can see what you can learn from it. She asked “what do you wish you had done differently?”

I believe that responding to this question will make a big difference for many people whose children are struggling with addiction and even those who are planning to have children in the future. What are you thinking about right now? This can be very helpful when responded to with lots of wisdom. Ask yourself the same question, what do you want to do differently? We have all made some mistakes in the past which when added up, probably may have made a difference, or maybe some little changes here and there may have prevented this (addiction) from happening. You may or may not get the satisfaction from all those deliberations but I want to share with you some of the things you need to discover to be a good parent. The following lessons can be extracted from this question:

Did you contribute to your sons Addiction: I would have learned to listen?

Listening is always the very first thing we must all chose to do. Listen to your children when they speak to us. Many times we often brash off what they say arguing that an addict doesn’t have anything worth listening to. Like in this case her son told her that there was nothing she could do to fix his problem. As a parent when you are told this, you may dispute it right away after all it is your duty to fix your children’s issues. Listening is very important because if she had done so, she would have sought the services of a professional. No addiction can be treated if the addict is in denial, and denial is one thing that only the addict can fix. So when this boy alluded to the fact that nothing could be done in his case, someone needed to have listen.

Professional advice are very important, parents must listen to them and apply their guidelines to the letter. It is very important to note that listening is different from looking for answers. Getting answers to questions or “what to do” solutions assume that there is a single answer or methodology that will awaken not just you but also your addicted loved one from this nightmare.

Another lesson would be learning to listen to your own internal with what you are told by your son. Take time and evaluate in this order; what have you heard, what do you feel and why are you being scared? Any emotional reactions you may have will be as a result of all you unresolved internal struggles.

Finally, from this question, you can also pick this lesion as a parent. It is necessary that you learn to listen to your heart and your mind. Take time to reconcile what the two are saying. Like for instance your heart will tell you that where there is life, there is always hope. It allows you to love someone even if their actions may seem to be communicating otherwise. On the other hand your mind/ brain will speak the realities of life and tell you facts about drug addiction. Therefore it is important to appreciate those matters of the heart and the mind is not about winning or losing the argument. Your heart and your mind must be reconciled to work together in unity. It is possible for your heart to accept that your son may die and in the same way it is also possible for your mind to understand that there may not be an answer for addiction and loving for just today is all you get. With those insights I appreciate that sometimes listening can be very difficult, but if this will help you get help to your children, then if am asked again what I wish I had done differently. Then I will give a straight answer that I wish I had learned how to listen to my children sooner. And now that you are a listening parent schedule for an appointment with doctor Akoury today to listen and apply some of her professional treatment options available for your addicted children.

Did you contribute to your sons Addiction: Is there anything you could have done differently?

The family union in fighting Heroin Addiction

May 15, 2015

The family union in fighting Heroin Addiction: The battles of Heroin Addiction in Families?

The family union in fighting Heroin Addiction must start before conception and to continue for life.

It is always said that a family that eat together stays together. Togetherness is one thing that is becoming very elusive in this generation of work and commitment. Parents are never there for their children and even for themselves. We are all looking for means of putting food on the table yet when that food is on the table we are not there to share it. Children eat alone as do the parents. In the previous two articles doctor Dalal Akoury has been taking us through the life and times of what heroin addicts go through either as individuals or as a group. We followed the story of Jimssy family and their struggle with addiction and what they were not able to do well that landed them into more problems. This family has seen it all and we want to sum up this discussion by looking at the family union in fighting heroin addiction and still following up on the conclusion story of the family of Jimssy.

The family union in fighting Heroin Addiction: Quitting or Stopping addiction

From the story of Jimssy, when their son watched her mother crying in pain and her father trying to calm her down by a shot of heroin, they all realize that something had to be done. What did they do? Keep reading and find out what the family union in fighting heroin addiction can do for you and your family. After this episode, Jimssy made effort to quit drugs on her own and each time she did, she failed to have a break through. It was after several attempts that Jim her husband gave a helping hand and she went cold turkey for two days but even this did not help and the condition became unbearable for her. She began shaking and sweating loosing muscle control in the process.

Initially when she was opting for change, she had made Jim promised her never to give her any drug no matter the case, but when she could not control herself and the need for drug took center stage she violently screamed for drugs and looking at her suffering, Jim gave in to avoid having a major seizure. While all this was happening, their son J.J was watching, seeing his mom have to lay there and be that sick and scream and cry, or watching her shoot dope. It then done on them that cold turkey was not working for her. She then remembered that years back when she first found out that Jim was a heroin addict, she had convinced him to seek for professional assistance from doctor Dalal Akoury which he did and for the 10 years with the help of doctor Akoury she had a very happy and productive marriage. Though Jim relapsed at some point, she realized that Dalal Akoury, Founder of AWAREmed Health and Wellness under the able leadership of doctor Akoury and her team of experts were her only way out.

She checked into the recovery program at this facility which also included methadone maintenance with counseling. And even though she wasn’t sure if it was going to work but her resolve to try kept her going and Jim was with her when she threw her needles away. She says that they broke them and tossed them away for the very first time.

The family union in fighting Heroin Addiction: Focus on Family

Since she started down the road to recovery, she hasn’t done any heroin. But that didn’t happen until she lost her home, totaled two cars, and almost saw her marriage collapse. Now living with relatives, she and her husband are trying to get their lives back in order. He’s back at work. They enrolled in a family counseling program, Focus on Families, where they were learning to be better parents and help their kids cope with their parents’ addiction.

Unfortunately, Jim relapsed about six weeks after starting the Focus on Families program, and the family dropped out. Jimssy had to go back to work in order to support the family, and her working hours prevented her from being able to take care of the children and continue the Focus on Families therapy sessions. Several months later, fortunately, Jim was able to get back to Dalal Akoury, Founder of AWAREmed Health and Wellness for a recovery program on his own, and he is now coping to maintain his sobriety.

Jimssy says she is glad to be getting back her life. She used to get up and, first thing, get a drug fix. Now, she gets up and makes coffee and visits the doctor Akoury office for follow up. “I’m learning to live a whole new way again.” She enjoys getting up with her kids, helping them get ready for school, and doing other routine things like driving her husband to work every day. “We are slowly getting things back to sort of normal,” she says.

Jimssy is not so sure of the effects of their actions and how it will impact on their children and especially for J.J. who knows that what his they did was wrong, illegal, and something they could have been thrown in jail for. He knows what drugs can do, he’s seen it firsthand.” Despite the horror of his finding Jim overdosed, she hopes the scene remains vivid in J.J.’s mind, as a deterrent to doing drugs. “If my son has to see something like that to keep the needle out of his arm, than I’d rather have that than see him someday dead from heroin.” Together they have enrolled their son J.J. into baseball and soccer so that he will become more interested in sports than mind-altering drugs.

Although it’s been a rough two years since she quit using heroin, Jimssy says she is finally starting to see herself as a “normal person” again: “Finally things are starting to open up again. I’m starting to see that there’s more out there to life than sitting around doing drugs thanks to doctor Dalal Akoury and the family of AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center.” What a story? Now you know and the decision is yours, choose wisely.

Tag Archives: Fighting heroin addiction