Dual diagnosis for addiction is a treatment method that simultaneously addresses substance use and a mental health disorder. Treating these co-occurring disorders together provides patients with a better chance of fully recovering and avoiding relapse. Historically, medical professionals and rehab centers focused their attention sequentially. This meant treating addiction by itself before attempting to address…
Heroin is a drug in the opioid family. Its short-acting nature means it has a significant impact following usage but leaves the bloodstream relatively quickly. The way it rapidly leaves the bloodstream means withdrawal periods for heroin are shorter than for other drugs. While this implies withdrawal symptoms will emerge within less than a day…
If you’re anything like me, you know your early days in recovery and the time you spent learning about addiction and recovery (whether in treatment or 12 Steps fellowships or both) were priceless, offering you an entire toolbox full of perspectives and practices for establishing a foundation for a new way of life, free from…
No one would argue nurses have an extremely challenging job – the high levels of work-related stress they face combined with daily exposure to sickness, death and trauma… No wonder one published study showed 22% of nurses (more than 1 in 5) were found to demonstrate symptoms of PTSD.[1] It’s also no wonder the stress…
Dual diagnosis treatment is a program that treats addiction and a co-occurring mental health disorder at the same time. This treatment option is in contrast to the historical norm, sequential treatment. In sequential treatment, patients received treatment for only their addiction before a treatment program addressed a co-occurring disorder such as depression. Unfortunately, that method…
For the estimated 22 million people in the United States in recovery from substance-use disorders[1], recovery group meetings have been part of a daily protocol to help them stay “clean and sober” one day at a time. But once the COVID-19 pandemic kicked into high gear, the vast majority of in-person meetings closed down and…
New research confirms what many people already know about marijuana. In spite of its increasing popularity, weed is not the benign, all-purpose nutrient that the industry promotes. Damage to the brain from cannabis use includes a person’s response time, executive functioning and residual verbal memory. In laymen’s terms this means that the cannabis user’s decision-making,…
Rehab 101 – How to Identify “The Next Right Thing to Do” in Recovery When many of us arrive in recovery—be it at a treatment center, a 12 Steps meeting or some other organized mode of recovery from substance abuse or addiction—the last thing we’re familiar with doing is “the next right thing.” That is,…
According to a just-released estimate by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), a record number of drug overdose deaths were reported this past year—93,000—a 29% increase over the previous record (in 2019).[1] Brandon Marshall, a Brown University public health researcher who tracks overdose trends, said, “This is a staggering loss of human life. The nation…
Methamphetamine (“meth”), a highly addictive stimulant, is a drug that starts and fades quickly, giving rise to people taking repeated doses in a “binge and crash” pattern. Often, those who abuse meth or become chemically dependent on it will forego food or sleep to stay high, while continuing to take meth every few hours for…
