SciCombinator

Longer periods of recovery reduce the likelihood of relapse, which may be due to a reduced ability of various stimuli to occasion alcohol or drug seeking. However, this hypothesis remains largely uninvestigated.

Epidemiological evidence suggests that peer influence plays a significant role in a variety of adolescent risk-taking behaviors, including tobacco use. We attempted to establish this relationship in a controlled laboratory setting.

Mixing alcohol with energy drinks is associated with heavier drinking and related problems among college students. However, little is known about how high school drinkers who mix alcohol with energy drinks (AmED) compare to those who do not (AwoED). This study compares high school AmED and AwoED users on their alcohol use during middle and high school, as well as key domains of functioning in high school.

Across the nation, growing numbers of individuals are exploring the use of cannabis for medical or recreational purposes, and the proportion of cannabis-positive drivers involved in fatal crashes increased from 8 percent in 2013 to 17 percent in 2014, raising concerns about the impact of cannabis use on driving. Previous studies have demonstrated that cannabis use is associated with impaired driving performance, but thus far, research has primarily focused on the effects of acute intoxication.

Overdose deaths from synthetic opioids (e.g., fentanyl) increased 10-fold in the United States from 2013 to 2018, despite such opioids being rare in illicit drug markets west of the Mississippi River. Public health professionals have feared a “fentanyl breakthrough” in western U.S. drug markets could further accelerate overdose mortality. We evaluated the number and nature of western U.S. fentanyl deaths using the most recent data available.

Over 100 million Americans are living with chronic pain, and pain is the most common reason that patients seek medical attention. Despite the prevalence of pain, the practice of pain management and the scientific discipline of pain research are relatively new fields compared to the rest of medicine - contributing to a twenty-first century dilemma for health care providers asked to relieve suffering in the “Fifth Vital Sign” era.

Buprenorphine is approved in many countries for the treatment of opioid use disorder (OUD), but problems with diversion and abuse exist. There is a need to understand how and why patients use diverted buprenorphine, and whether barriers to access contribute to illicit use.

Supervised injection services (SISs) have been developed to promote safer drug injection practices, enhance health-related behaviors among people who inject drugs (PWID), and connect PWID with external health and social services. Nevertheless, SISs have also been accused of fostering drug use and drug trafficking.

According to multiple studies, e-cigarette use among adolescents is associated with subsequent smoking initiation. However, little is known about its effect on the transition from smoking initiation to daily smoking.

It is generally acknowledged that e-cigarettes are unlikely to be as harmful as conventional cigarettes, but there is little data that quantifies their relative harms. We investigated the biological response to e-cigarette aerosol exposure (versus conventional cigarette smoke exposure) at the cellular level, by exposing human coronary artery endothelial cells (HCAEC) to aqueous filtered extracts of e-cigarette aerosol or cigarette smoke and looking at gene expression changes consistent with a stress response. This included genes controlled by the oxidant-stress sensing transcription factor NFR2 (NFE2L2), and cytochrome P450 family members.