Essays on Opiates

Abstract

The term "opiate" combines substance extracted from opium, the most important of which is morphine, codeine, papaverine, which is widely used as medicines and paramorphine - used mainly in medical industry to produce medications, as well as synthesized derivatives of morphine, which belong to the semi-synthetic opiates and among which the most famous for their narcotic properties is heroin. Substances, differ in structure from the structure of morphine but operating on a similar mechanism (through opioid receptors), are belonged to the opioids (Kuehn, 2007). A rich lexicon of slang in relation to opiates (especially heroin) reflects not only the " ...

Abstract

Effective medication reconciliation is an integral and vital part of the care transitions process. The hospitalist team of St. Joseph Hospital (SJH) discharge patients from the hospital and refer them to the hospice. However, the appropriate comfort care and medications provision is not always available. Patient caregivers and the hospice staff faced some unforeseen problems and difficulties upon enrolling patients into hospice after their discharge from the hospital. Among other problems, these difficulties include inaccessibility of medications and appropriate prescription for them. At times, scripts for opiates, anxiolytics, laxatives and antiemetic agents for symptom management were not available at ...

The drug that is highlighted in this paper is opiates. Opiates come in many forms are usually prescribed as pain medication. Opiates include most prescription pain medications such as: heroin, morphine, codeine, hydrocodone, oxycodone, et al. These drugs, while good for a short time after a serious accident, surgery, or other medical condition, to control pain, are highly addictive and can become an addictive substance in an individual who is prone to addictive habits. (The Abuse of Prescription Drugs, 2009) Although opiates are one of the most addictive substances and cause thousands of deaths from self-medicating, there are not ...

Executive Summary

Background: DeepStream Virtual Reality was created by Howard Rose and Ari Hollander to improve health and wellness. The research has shown that virtual reality has therapeutic effect, while it improves the process of rehabilitation and physical health as well as it promotes healthier lifestyle.

The scientific research of the recent 10 years has demonstrated that virtual reality can fundamentally lessen torment, soothe pain, and assemble strength. The organizers of DeepStream VR was involved in the research groups that have studied the process of torment control and constructed the principal VR torment help applications ("Deepstream VR | About VR For Health"). ...

Summary

Over the past few years, there has been a growing interest among neurosurgeons on the potential for therapies that impact on diseases, over and above the movement disorders and pain. One of the biggest targets of this increasing interest has been the nucleus accumbens. It has been studied for long, as an area of the brain that mediates a variety of behaviors, including reward and satisfaction (Salgado & Kaplitt, 2015). With this in mind, the modulation of the biology of the Nucleus Accumbens through either deep brain stimulation or through biological therapies like gene therapy or the transplantation of cells ...

A brief account of the patient/client assessment

Drug misuse within state prisons has persistently been a major problem for the healthcare personnel. The treatment of misusers within these units is however a challenge for those concerned and this is attributed to a host of factors which dependently or independently leads to fragmented measures of managing this population. These challenges range from the vulnerability of the prisoners to self-harm and suicide cases while in prison; the occurrence of death upon serving their term due to intentional or accidental opiate overdose; the lacking measures of counseling as part of an integrated withdrawal system; the non-adherence to national and ...

Position for Opiates: The Benefits to the Community, Cost Savings in the Long Run

This brief summarizes recent analysis examining the advantages and costs of material opiates therapy. An estimated $275 billion dollars yearly goes to investments in the U.S. on healthcare costs, lost work productivity, costs associated with drug-related criminal offenses, and on other costs relevant to drugs like opiates (Doweiko, 2011). The approximately $18 billion dollars invested yearly on substance therapies is funded primarily by public money, and studies to address the affordability of these therapies are growing. Issues arising include the extent to which therapy applications fall under the cover of healthcare benefits and the come back on these financial ...

Introduction

Ever since the police and related agencies within states and the Federal Government initiated mechanisms for keeping data on crime, it has become easier to deduce the trends in criminal behavior and hence channel resources as duly required in combating such crimes. From statistical data gathered over a period of time; state machineries are able to restructure their strategies so that they better adapt to the changing face of criminality. The government can also rely on such data to initiate discussions that may precipitate to policy formulation, drafting of legislations, and development of the necessary institutional framework.

The state of ...

The main objective of this study is to understand, evaluate and analyze the fateful sentinel event, which struck Mr. B, who was sixty- seven years old and was taken to the Emergency Department (ED) of a sixty bed rural hospital. Mr. B complained to Nurse J of rigorous pain in his hip and left leg after he lost his balance and fell after tripping over his dog. The ED physician and nurse after thorough medical check up treated Mr. B. However, within thirteen minutes of the treatment procedure, Mr. B's health started deteriorating. He was kept on ventilator and was ...

Abstract

The research paper discusses the origin and nature of methadone, including the historical aspect of its development and further commercial and scientific use. The paper also describes the pharmacology of methadone, including the route of administration of the drug, its metabolism and its mechanism of action. Next section of the paper explains the experience in medical use of methadone, as it`s a great alternative to the painkillers based on the opiates, it plays a major role in the therapy of maintaining and replacement and treating the withdrawals syndromes. The positive effects on the pregnant patients are also described here with a ...

The nature of addiction can be debated on both social and biological perspectives. Most people view opiate addiction as a sign of irresponsibility among the users. Drug abuse generally has been accepted in most parts of the society due to the availability of corrective measures, such as treatment options. The American Medical Association prohibited the use of pharmacotherapy as a treatment to opiate addicts in 1920. The medical profession later renewed the policies on treatment of opiate addiction in the 1950’s when addiction was considered a medical disease (Barnett, Zaric, & Brandeau, 2001). Physicians began exercising short-term opiate substitution on addicts. Forcing ...

Problem Statement/Introduction:

Prescription pain medication abuse has become an epidemic. The statistics on this form of abuse are increasing and are fatal. Prescription opioid pain medicine are being abused and are leading to more deaths than all other street illicit drugs including cocaine and heroin. Over 86% of OxyContin abusers report that they had not been prescribed the drug for medical purposes. Health care providers wrote 259 million prescriptions for painkillers in 2012, enough for every American to have a bottle of pills. In 2012, of the 41,502 drug overdose deaths in the USA, 22,114 (53%) were related to pharmaceuticals. ...

(Insert College/and or class)

December of 2014

Opiate abuse in the 21st century is on a huge problem, and there doesn’t seem to be much slowing down either. Opiates are derived from opium plants, and can be seen in a plethora different street and pharmaceutical drugs. Some of these include heroin, codeine, oxycotin, vicodin, methadone, and many others. Normally. People take these medications to relieve pain, and most of them are only available via a doctor prescribing them, but once a tolerance is built up to the drug internally, the individual must use higher dosages to achieve the same effects. Also, obtaining these drugs illegally ...

Introduction

The topic of this paper presents a study from a sociological perspective on how the abuse of opiates affects society. The viewpoint renders its gaze from the application of conflict theory. The progression of this research paper posits its analysis through several stages. Beyond the introduction herein, the conversation moves into a bit of history, and thereafter assesses a reasoning section prior to approaching a conclusion. What is conflict theory and how may it be defined? According to the ‘Sociological Guide’ conflict theory may be defined as a collection of several ‘conflict theories,’ however the prominent one links to the Karl Marx model. The Marxist ...

"The Lives of the Twelve Caesars" (De vita Caesarum) is the main work of Roman historian Suetonius, written during his tenure as secretary of Emperor Hadrian. It is a collection of biographies of Julius Caesar and the first 11 Roman princeps, from Augustus to Domitian. This work is one of the most important works of antiquity. It is written in simple language, and each biography of Emperors is written in a certain pattern. For example, Suetonius description always starts on the origin of of the each ruler, the early years of his life, his social activities, then proceeds to personal qualities ...

The Opium Poppy, also known as Papaver somniferum, grows mainly in dry & warm climates. The color of the flowers of this plant is red and purple and they mainly grow across southern Asia from Turkey through Pakistan and Laos, where the weather conditions are more favorable for their cultivation . In the US, it is mostly grown in South America. It belongs to family Papaveraceae, Genus Papaver, and species somniferum. Some people may question the legality of opium poppy because as most people know, the drug derived from the flower is heroin. There is a process in which three months ...

Throughout history individuals use drugs for different reasons. The abuse of drugs has different effects on different individuals even long after using drugs. Researchers continue to experiment on the area of drug abuse, but the number of drugs in the society today, makes it difficult to ascertain the impact of every drug that is on the market. In order to understand how the different types of drugs work on an individual, one must understand the various changes that occur in different parts of the body. CNS, depressants, narcotics, tobacco, alcohol, and stimulants are some of the drugs of abuse. ...

"The Lives of the Twelve Caesars" (De vita Caesarum) is the main work of Roman historian Suetonius, written during his tenure as secretary of Emperor Hadrian. It is a collection of biographies of Julius Caesar and the first 11 Roman princeps, from Augustus to Domitian. This work is one of the most important works of antiquity. It is written in simple language, and each biography of Emperors is written in a certain pattern. For example, Suetonius description always starts on the origin of of the each ruler, the early years of his life, his social activities, then proceeds to personal qualities ...

Substance Abuse

The biopsychosocial risk factors associated with alcohol dependence. Dependence on alcohol is a worrying concern for many. It not only affects the person addicted to it but people around too. Scientists have always tried to understand what it is that gets one person addicted while others exposed to the same circumstances and environment stay away from addiction. There are biopsychosocial risk factors associated with alcohol dependence and a lot of theories that try to explain addiction. Some of the theories that explain alcohol addiction are Genetic theories, which deal with the genetic predisposition to alcohol addiction, with genes passed on ...

Teratogens are genotoxins that can potentially disrupt the genetic makeup of developing cells, resulting in aberrations that can manifest disabling physical and mental abnormalities in a fetus. Teratogens can cross the placenta and reach the fetus, which quashes the popular belief that a fetus is shielded from external harmful influences. This indicates that the placenta is incapable of blocking teratogenic metabolites from reaching the fetus. Teratogenesis can be defined as birth defects or congenital malformations occurring in utero due to exposure to external factors. Such factors could be environmental, chemical or biological in nature. Factors such as the time of exposure, ...

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Introduction

Heroin belongs to the opiate family, a class of drugs derived from either the flowers of the poppy plant, or from their synthetic substitutes. In heroin’s case, it is produced from morphine. This is a naturally occurring material derived from the seedpod of the poppy plants. Like numerous drugs made from opiates, heroin is incredibly a strong painkiller Every opiate abuse, as well as heroin and several prescriptions pain relievers, carries with them a solid risk of addiction along with physical dependence. Heroin commonly appears as a white otherwise brown powder. Purest heroin is a white powder, ...

Introduction

For any company to be successful there is the need for the human resource department to take measures to reduce the impact of drug use in the workplace. One of these strategies is conducting random and regular drug checks for the workers in the company. According to the data provided by the department of labour in United States of America, employers suffer about 100 billion dollars in losses from problems associated with drug use at the workplace. The losses are incurred by low productivity of the workers, non-attendance, violence at the workplace, defiance and laziness at the workplace. The ...

Many people who are addicted to hard drugs are under treatment and rehabilitation due to the many risks that exist as a result of the risky behavior. Most of these addicts risk contracting infectious diseases such as HIV, hepatitis (B or C) and even sexually transmitted diseases. Therefore, there is a need to create rehabilitation programs to aid in the recovery and freedom from various forms of drug addiction. One of such therapy programs is the methadone maintenance therapy program. Research shows that this is one of the most effective programs in helping addicts fight with various forms of addiction (Weschsberg, ...

Opiates refer to groups of drugs that are derived from poppy seeds usually found in Asia. In medicine field, the term opiate refers only to the narcotic opioid alkaloids extracted as natural products from the opium poppy plant known as Papaver somniferum (Earhart). These drugs have a high potential of being abused by users and are known to bock pain temporarily. It is very difficult for someone who uses opiates regularly to avoid getting hooked up by the use of drugs. The prescription of opiates is mostly in pill form although some like heroin can be a powder that is ...

41. Alcoholism is the impairment of physical and mental health, which results from the consumption of large amounts of alcoholic beverages. This excessive consumption hinders effective fulfillment of social, family and occupational responsibilities. 42. A typical alcohol dependent person has physical and psychological dependence on the consumption of alcoholic drinks. Such a person shows alcohol withdrawal symptoms, which range from tremors to other serious manifestations of physical dependence. There are also alcohol associated illnesses among these individuals. Individuals will present with an addiction to alcohol where these individuals will use all the money to obtain alcohol. 43. Amphetamines ...

The New Heroin Epidemic

According to Gilderman (2012) the United States experienced their largest heroin epidemic from 1967 to 1971; the second largest epidemic lasted from 1976 to 1981 (para. 9). So generally when people hear about a heroin epidemic they immediately think back to the 60s and 70s. There seems to be no recognition that there could be an ongoing epidemic of heroin use right now in the United States. Not only that, the epidemic is global including large areas of sub-Saharan African countries as well as in other locations around the world.

The question considered in this essay is: Does a new heroin ...

The Rise of Prescription Painkiller:

OxyContin was developed by Purdue Pharma L.P., pharmaceutical company in Stamford, Connecticut. A controlled-release formulation of oxycodone hydrochloride, OxyContin was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in 1995 for treatment of moderate to severe pain; it was designed to give a sustained release of its active ingredient, oxycodone, over a period of twelve hours (Pacheco, 2002)

OxyContin History and Growth Background

OxyContin has been placed in Schedule II of Controlled Substances Act of 1970, indicating that while it is very effective, there is still a risk of addiction. It carries a safety warning called the “black box” cautioning users not to crush, ...