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And so their pain continues to get in the way of their addiction recovery -- or they seek pain relief in the same addictive substances they're trying to avoid. But a new study shows the potential for patients to break out of that cycle through a non-drug approach that combines behavioral therapy and social support to help them manage their pain. The low-cost approach, grounded in psychological theories of pain, could help address the nation's epidemic of addictions to opioid painkillers and illicit drugs. Veterans who received this pain-focused care while also being treated for addiction found that the intensity of their pain decreased, their ability to function increased, and their alcohol use went down, compared to veterans who received a less-focused approach. However, the two groups had similar rates of drug use. Just 10 weekly sessions of the approach, called ImPAT for Improving Pain during Addiction Treatment, had an effect that lasted up to a year in 55 veterans ...

Researchers examined participants who were known to begin drinking during adolescence (n=112), giving them VLM assessments at two different times: first, prior to the onset of drinking (at age 12-16); and second, approximately six years later. Participants w ere grouped, based on their alcohol involvement at follow-up, as moderate (≤4 drinks per occasion), binge (5+ drinks per occasion), or extreme-binge (10+ drinks per occasion) drinkers. Results showed that the amount of alcohol consumed during adolescence adversely affected VLM performance in a dose-dependent manner. The acquisition of new verbal information seemed to be particularly affected, especially for the heaviest drinkers. While there were no gender differences in VLM performance, the authors note that the extreme-binge group had roughly 50 percent more boys than the moderate and binge groups, which is consistent with data showing that high-school boys are up to three times more likely to be extreme-binge drinkers. ...

According to first author Dr. Lena Rademacher, postdoctoral fellow at the University of Lübeck in Germany, a major challenge in understanding substance-related disorders lies in uncovering why only some individuals become addicted. Researchers think some people could possess a trait that predisposes them to addiction, and suspect that brain circuits involving dopamine may be involved. Drugs of abuse release dopamine, and addiction to nicotine is associated with abnormalities in the dopamine system. But researchers are uncertain if smoking induces those abnormalities or if they already exist and contribute to risk of nicotine addiction. Senior author Dr. Ingo Vernaleken, Professor at RWTH Aachen University in Germany, led a team of researchers examining dopamine function in chronic smokers before and after long-term cessation. The researchers used a brain imaging technique called positron emission tomography to measure an index of the capacity for dopamine production in 30 men wh...

The discovery could explain the repeated -- and costly -- failure over the last 20 years of clinical trials of potential pain-killing drugs that targeted the substance, known as 'Substance P'. Substance P is produced in both the central nervous system (CNS) -- the brain and spinal cord -- and in our peripheral nervous system (PNS) -- all the other nerves and nerve cells that send signals to the brain. The new research, by the Hebei Medical University in China and the University of Leeds in the UK, has found that, in the peripheral nervous system, Substance P makes nerve cells less responsive and excitable, thereby reducing sensations of pain. This is in direct contrast to its role in the central nervous system, where it triggers very different signals, exciting neurons and so promoting pain. Lead researcher Professor Nikita Gamper, from the University of Leeds, explains: "We were really surprised by the results -- Substance P is described in the literature as a mol...

The national study, by Michigan State University's Cliff Broman, also indicates that the effects were more significant among white people and males. "While there have been many studies linking alcohol and drug use by parents to substance use among youths, there is limited research on how the a vailability of alcohol and drugs in the home may influence patterns of use among offspring in the future," said Broman, professor of sociology. "These findings provide evidence that the availability of illegal drugs and alcohol in the home while growing up is a critical factor in the later use of substances." Broman analyzed data from some 15,000 participants in the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health over the course of three waves -- when the survey participants were, on average, 16, 22 and 29 years old. Generally, participants who had illegal drugs and alcohol e asily available to them during adolescence started using drugs and alcohol at an earl...

Cocaine addiction is a debilitating neurological disorder that affects more than 700,000 people in the United States alone, according to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. With repeated use, tolerance may develop, meaning more of the drug is required to achieve the same euphoric effect. Cocaine addiction can be characterized by repeated attempts at abstinence that often end in relapse. "Scientists have known for years that cocaine affects the dopamine system and dopamine transporters, so we designed our study to gain a better understanding of how tolerance to cocaine develops via the dopamine transporters," said Sara R. Jones, Ph.D., professor of physiology and pharmacology at Wake Forest Baptist and lead author of the study. "Currently there isn't any effective treatment available for cocaine addiction so understanding the underlying mechanism is essential for targeting potential new treatments." Using an animal model, the r...