Exercise in Addiction Treatment

Exercise is a helpful component in many treatment programs when implemented with cognitive behavioral therapy. Exercise promotes smoking cessation. Exercise may exert beneficial effects by addressing psychosocial and physiological needs that nicotine replacement alone does not. Exercise reduces stress and helps prevent weight gain following cessation. Scientists are researching to determine if and how exercise programs can play a similar role in the treatment of other forms of drug abuse.

Addiction Treatment Medications

Medications help with different aspects of the treatment process. Withdrawal Medications can suppress withdrawal symptoms during detoxification. However, medically assisted detoxification is not in itself "treatment." Detoxification is only the first step in the treatment process. Patients who go through medically assisted withdrawal but do not receive any further treatment show drug abuse patterns similar to those who were never treated. Treatment Medications can help reestablish normal brain functioning and prevent relapse by diminishing cravings an addict may have. Currently, doctors prescribe detox medications for opioid additions like heroin, morphine, tobacco (nicotine) and alcohol addiction, and are developing others for treating stimulant addictions to cocaine, methamphetamine and cannabis (marijuana) addictions. Most people with severe addiction problems use and abuse more than one drug and require treatment for multiple substance abuses. Opioids Methadone, buprenorphine and, for some individuals, naltrexone are effective medications for treating opiate addictions. Acting on the same targets in the brain as heroin and morphine, methadone and buprenorphine suppress withdrawal symptoms and relieve cravings. Naltrexone works by blocking the effects of heroin or other opioids at their receptor sites and doctors only prescribe these drugs for certain patients who underwent detoxification. Because of compliance issues, naltrexone is not as widely used as other medications. All medication helps patients disengage from seeking out drugs and other criminal behavior, and aid addicts in being more receptive to behavioral treatments. Tobacco Drug companies make many kinds of nicotine replacement therapies including the patch, a spray, gum and lozenges, which are available over the counter. In addition, the Federal Drug Administration approves two prescription medications for tobacco addiction: bupropion and varenicline. These drugs have different act on the brain differently, but both help to prevent relapse in people trying to quit smoking. Doctors recommend each medication for use in combination with behavioral treatments, including group and individual therapies, as well as telephone-quit lines. Alcohol The Federal Drug Administration approves three medications for treating alcohol dependence: naltrexone, acamprosate and disulfiram. A fourth drug called topiramate exhibits encouraging results in clinical trials. Naltrexone blocks opioid receptors that are involved in the rewarding effects of drinking and in the craving for alcohol. Naltrexone reduces relapsing to heavy drinking and is highly effective in some patients, likely due to genetic differences. Doctors believe that acamprosate reduces symptoms of protracted withdrawal, such as insomnia, anxiety, restlessness and dysphoria, which is an unpleasant or uncomfortable emotional state, similar to depression, anxiety or irritability. Acamprosate may be more effective in patients with severe dependence. Disulfiram interferes with the degradation of alcohol, resulting in the accumulation of acetaldehyde, which, in turn, produces a very unpleasant reaction that includes flushing, nausea and heart palpitations when a patient drinks alcohol. Compliance can be a problem, but among patients who are highly motivated, disulfiram can be very effective.

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Drugs, Pick Your Pleasure

People use drugs for a variety of reasons. Drugs can affect the brain with very different results. Psychoactive drugs affect the function of the brain resulting in changes of perception, mood, consciousness, cognition and behavior.
While medication is prescriptive, people also often use psychoactive substances recreationally or for advantage, due to an often-euphoric nature and the capacity of some substances to increase alertness.
There are three main categories of psychoactive drugs.

Stimulants

Stimulants, sometimes called uppers, act to rejuvenate, energize and to alert, without dramatically affecting perception. Examples of stimulants are: coffee, nicotine, amphetamines, cocaine and ecstasy, among others.

Depressants

Depressants, sometimes called downers, chill a person out, reduce anxiety and sedate the user. Depressants consist of sedatives, hypnotics and narcotics. Examples of depressants are alcohol, nitrous oxide, barbiturates, benzodiazepines and opioids.

Opioids

Common opioids are morphine, heroin, codeine, hydrocodone, oxycodone and methadone.
Hallucinogens consist of psychedelics, dissociative- and delirium-inducting substances. These drugs produce distinct subjective alterations of perception, sense of space and time, consciousness and mood. Examples of psychedelics are LSD, mushrooms and cannabis.

Pain Management

Most people use psychoactive drugs to manage pain. Analgesics or painkillers, act on the central nervous system and include NSAIDs, like aspirin, ibuprofen and the highly addictive class of opiate narcotics, such as morphine and oxycodone.
The desire and need to alter consciousness is not a recent phenomenon, and dates back to the advent of man. Archaeological evidence indicates that ancestors used plants as psychoactive substances almost ten thousand years ago. Many preindustrial cultures used psychoactive plants such as jimson, mescaline and psilocybin mushrooms for religious rituals.
Many animals also consume psychoactive plant. For example: cat ingesting catnip. Traditional myths contain references of animals introducing sacred plants to humans. The cultural use of psychoactive substances covers a vast historical landscape. Nevertheless, there may also be an evolutionary relationship between animals and psychoactive plants and the existence of these chemicals and receptors within the human nervous system.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychoactive_drug