This MedLibrary.org supplementary page on Drug use is provided directly from the open source Wikipedia as a service to our readers. Please see the note below on authorship of this content, as well as the Wikipedia usage guidelines. To search for other content from our encyclopedia supplement, please use the form below:
Related Sponsors
Drugs can be used in many different ways, as detailed below.
Contents |
Medication
People can use drugs to relieve pain or discomfort or to cure or prevent disease. Not all medication is drugs however.
Recreational drug use
Recreational drug use is the use of psychoactive drugs for recreational purposes rather than for work, medical or spiritual purposes, although the distinction is not always clear. At least one psychopharmacologist who has studied this field refers to it as the 'Fourth Drive,' arguing that the human instinct to seek mind-altering substances has so much force and persistence that it functions like the human drives for hunger, thirst and shelter.[1]
Responsible drug use
The concept of responsible drug use is that a person can use recreational drugs with reduced or eliminated risk of negatively affecting other parts of one's life or other people's lives. Advocates of this idea point to the many well-known artists and intellectuals who have used drugs, experimentally or otherwise, with few detrimental effects on their lives. Critics argue that the drugs are escapist--and dangerous, unpredictable and sometimes addictive; thus predicating the idea of a responsible use of drugs as an idea, ultimately disputable upon debate.
Gateway drug theory
The gateway drug theory is the hypothesis that the use of soft drugs leads to a higher, future risk of hard drug use and crime.[2] The term is also used to describe introductory experiences to addictive substances. Some believe[3][4][5] tobacco, alcohol, and marijuana are gateway drugs.
Some research suggests that serious drug abusers adopt an atypical drug use sequence with use of other drugs initiated before marijuana or alcohol.[6] There are many pharmacological similarities between various drugs of abuse. Individual social histories show that "hard" drug users do progress from one drug to another, but the reasons are not clear enough to generalise a gateway.[7]
Drug addiction
Drug addiction is a condition characterized by compulsive drug intake, craving and seeking, despite what the majority of society may perceive as the negative consequences associated with drug use.[8]
Drug abuse
Drug abuse has a wide range of definitions related to taking a psychoactive drug or performance enhancing drug for a non-therapeutic or non-medical effect. Some of the most commonly abused drugs include alcohol, tobacco amphetamines, barbiturates, benzodiazepines, cocaine, and opiates, opioids, and their derivatives which typically have opioid agonist actions though some don't (e.g. morphine and it's derivatives like heroin (3,6-diacetylmorphine), codeine, dextromethorphan an NMDA antagonist opioid with no opioid activity.) Use of these drugs may lead to criminal penalty in addition to possible physical, social, and psychological harm, both strongly depending on local jurisdiction.[9]Although there is criticism on making drug use illegal and throwing non-violent drug offenders in jail. on Other definitions of drug abuse fall into four main categories: public health definitions, mass communication and vernacular usage, medical definitions, and political and criminal justice definitions.citation needed
See also
References
- ^ Siegel, Ronald K (2005). Intoxication: The universal studios drive for mind-altering substances. Vermont: Park Street Press, pp vii. ISBN 1-59477-069-7.
- ^ The road to ruin? Sequences of initiation into drug use and offending by young people in Britain
- ^ http://www.wnet.org/closetohome/science/html/gateway.html+%22gateway+drugs%22&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=2&gl=us
- ^ Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse
- ^ Drug Abuse Resistance Education
- ^ Mackesy-Amiti ME, Fendrich M, Goldstein PJ (1997). "Sequence of drug use among serious drug users: typical vs atypical progression.". Drug and alcohol dependence 45: 185. doi:.
- ^ Contents | Marijuana and Medicine: Assessing the Science Base | Institute of Medicine
- ^ "Principles of Drug Addiction Treatment: A Research Based Guide" Preface, National Institute on Drug Abuse
- ^ (2002). Mosby's Medical, Nursing, & Allied Health Dictionary. Sixth Edition. Drug abuse definition, p. 552. Nursing diagnoses, p. 2109. ISBN 0-323-01430-5.
Wikipedia content modification information:
- This page was last modified on 22 September 2008, at 22:21.
Wikipedia Authorship and Review
Wikipedia content provided here is not reviewed directly by MedLibrary.org. Wikipedia content is authored by an open community of volunteers and is not produced by or in any way affiliated with MedLibrary.org.
Wikipedia Usage Guidelines
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article on "Drug use".
The URL for this specific entry is:
All Wikipedia text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License. (See Copyrights for details). Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.