Most people assume that anyone who regularly drinks too much is either alcohol dependent or an alcoholic. This is a widely held belief for a number of complex and culturally engrained reasons that there’s simply not enough time to parse out at the moment. […]
For many people, the dividing line between casual, social drinking, and alcoholism is the ability to stop consuming alcohol before it becomes too much. Addiction experts might suggest that’s an oversimplified version of addiction and they’d be right. There are other factors, such as genetic […]
Just one year after executives at Purdue Pharma, the makers of OxyContin, pleaded guilty in federal court and paid $635 million in fines for misleading doctors about the addictive properties of its bestselling painkiller, a tiny medical clinic opened near the Los Angeles neighborhood of […]
Dr. Deborah Serani, a licensed psychologist, professor and award-winning author made a stark confession to her audience at New York’s Adelphi University. “Dad’s gun is in the left hand side of his dresser drawer. When everybody leaves, go in and get it,” she said, narrating […]
Since late 2014, when the California Department of Corrections launched a statewide program to end the flourishing market for illegal drugs in its penitentiaries, drug use has actually increased. The $8 million plan, which included the purchase of drug-detecting scanners and drug-sniffing dogs, was put […]
For the estimated 2.2 million Americans suffering an addiction to prescription painkillers or heroin, federal regulations have it made it difficult to get legal access to a medication that can save their lives. Buprenorphine + Naloxone ease the physically painful squeeze of opiate addiction when […]
This November, registered California voters will decide whether or not to legalize the recreational use of marijuana. The Adult Use of Marijuana Act (AUMA), aka Prop 64, received official clearance in June from the Secretary of State’s office after the initiative surpassed the 600,000 signatures […]
The average American medicine cabinet is generally a time-lapse snapshot of who suffered what and how long ago. According to a study released in JAMA Internal Medicine, 66 percent of people keep leftover, unused medications after they’ve stopped using them. Many of these unused prescription […]
Almost four decades ago, the then governor of California signed into law a bill requiring prisons to make punishment and incapacitation, rather than rehabilitation, the primary goals of state penal facilities. As a result, the prison population went from around 20,000 people to 172,000 and […]
Here’s an interesting fact that many people are likely unaware of; regardless of what illness the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approves a medication for, physicians are free to prescribe that same drug for any other condition they deem medically appropriate. This practice, referred to […]
