Should Pharmacological Treatment for Adolescents with Opioid Dependence Differ from that for Adults?

Ketamine misuse is the most common illicit drug used in Singapore, Hong Kong and areas of China and Taiwan. A Chinese American male presented to our inpatient rehabilitation unit with genital urinary complaints, of hematuria, dysuria and frequency. He had been misusing ketamine for many years and had similar complaints in the past. Healthcare providers should be aware that ketamine user disorder may present primarily with genital urinary complaints. Cessation of ketamine use is of upmost importance since chronic irreversible fibrosis of the genital urinary tract may occur with continued misuse.

Introduction: The purpose of this study is to determine whether waterpipe use may contribute to the onset of cigarette use or if it may help current cigarette smokers reduce or quit cigarette smoking.

Method: This is a cross-sectional study of 622 current waterpipe smokers selected randomly from within 15 different randomly selected waterpipe lounges in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Using an iPad volunteers completed a self-administered survey regarding their smoking history, tobacco withdrawal symptoms, and demographics. Those who initially started smoking with waterpipe and those who initially started smoking with cigarettes were analyzed separately.

Results: Logistic regression showed that both the years of waterpipe use and withdrawal symptoms significantly predicted being a current cigarette smoker (waterpipe starters: years of waterpipe use: OR=1.18, C.I.=[1.07-1.30] withdrawal symptoms: OR=1.11, C.I.=[1.01-1.22] and cigarette starters: years of waterpipe use: OR=1.08, C.I.=[1.00-1.17] withdrawal symptoms: OR=1.15, C.I.=[1.03-1.27]. However, the likelihood of being a current cigarette smoker decreased as age and frequency of waterpipe use increased. Additionally, there was evidence that waterpipe withdrawal symptoms were predicted by frequency of waterpipe use.

Conclusions: Waterpipe use may be a potential gateway to cigarette use. However, among those who initially started smoking with cigarettes, older age and greater frequency of waterpipe may protect against cigarette use.

Implications: The study findings add additional evidence that smoking waterpipe may lead to initiate another smoking behavior, in a particular cigarette use, especially among young individuals. However, long history and greater use of waterpipe could be associated with less likelihood of being a current cigarette user. Health promotion and intervention programs must consider the mutual association between waterpipe and cigarette use among youth and young adults in order to develop effective health promotion programs.

Background: The difference in life expectancy at birth between males and females in Russia is unprecedently high compared with developed countries.

Objective: The aim of the current study was to examine the aggregate-level relationship between the consumption of different alcoholic beverages and gender difference in life expectancy in Russia between 1970 and 2015.

Method: To estimate the relation between these variables across the study period a time series analysis was performed using the statistical package “Statistica 12. Stat Soft”.

Results: The results of ARIMA analysis indicate that vodka sales are closely linked with gender difference in life expectancy in Russia: an additional liter of vodka sales per capita was estimated to increase in the difference between male and female life expectancy by 4.1%. The results of the analysis also suggest that 18.5% of the difference in life expectancy between males and females in Russia could be attributed to consumption of vodka.

Conclusions: This piece of evidence provides support for the hypothesis that high level of vodka consumption in conjunction with binge drinking pattern may be a major reason for the high gender difference in life expectancy and its dramatic fluctuations in Russia during the last few decades

The use of smokeless tobacco, which includes snuff and chewing tobacco, is low in majority of the countries when examined for both women and men. In general, the use of smokeless tobacco among men is more common in South and Southeast Asia than in any other region. Yet large portions of the Borena’s adult pastoral communities are smokeless tobacco users. It is needed a call to action for policymakers and health professionals to improve the health and well being of pastoral communities of Ethiopia’s adults by increasing their access to anti notice information on smokeless tobacco use.

Behavioral Healthcare Centers often find themselves frustrated by their lack of success in defining and meeting their key organizational objectives. This frustration is not the result of lack of skill or passion, but rather lack of clear organizational goals and concrete measurements. Leaders in these organizations often confuse “doing good” with being effective. This commentary will illustrate how behavioral healthcare managers can learn from their for-profit counterparts and translate their organization’s mission into clear performance measures across the company. T he first thing any organization needs to do when it comes to goal-setting and measurement is to understand their “big picture”. Executives must answer the question as to why their organization exists in the first place. What is the mission that will drive all other decisions in the organization? This mission should not be so generic that it could fit every other organization in your industry. Rather, it should help everyone in the agency understand what makes it unique.

In The Gambia like all nations, drug abuse is seen as a social and health problem that has many serious implications for the physical, social, psychological and intellectual development of the victims more especially, the children. Therefore, it continues to be a concern to families, community leaders, educators, social workers, health care professionals, academics, government and its development partners. Though there some studies on drug abuse, there is none on children and drug abuse focusing on the street children the most vulnerable category. Street children are hypothesized to be more at risk of any epidemic including drug abuse. This study sought to determine the risk and prevalence of drug abuse among street children focusing on those in Praveen, the car parks. The research was focused on six critical areas: level of knowledge of drug abuse, perception towards it, level of knowledge of the causes of it in the community and among street children, level of knowledge of negative impacts of it, level of knowledge of the preventive methods; and level of knowledge of the support services and treatments needed by victims. A structured questionnaire was used to collect the data from thirty five participants (i.e. one driver and six casual apprentices from each of the five car parks) were interviewed. The data was presented and analyzed using tables and percentage. The findings revealed among other things, that there is high level of awareness of drug abuse but the feelings towards it is mixed. Like other children, street children are abusing drugs mainly due to peer influence with the ultimate objective of getting high to relief stress, group recognition, trusted by peers, etc. Similarly, participants are highly aware of the negative impacts encompassing f ighting, stealing, mental illness, etc. To finance the behaviour, victims are engaged in all types of dangerous antisocial behaviour including romantic ones exposing them to a range of diseases including STIs and HIV/AIDS. Marijuana is the most commonly abused drug. Though in the minority, some have started experimenting cocaine/ coke, hashish; and heroin. While participants have good knowledge of the critical methods to fight drug abuse, the support services needed by victims, victims are mostly reluctant to seek the services not only because they are hard to find but fear societal stigmatization, exclusion and discrimination and professionals’ maltreatments.