Studies indicate a strong relationship between participant retention at follow-up and the efficacy of pharmacological treatments in combination with behavioral interventions for MA patients [24, 25]. The review findings indicated that pharmacological treatments alone led to significant reductions in craving, withdrawal, psychosis and depression among amphetamine abusers [14–19]. If some medicines can reduce amphetamines-related symptoms, they can be used in drug treatment services. Furthermore, using BCBT is likely to increase the outcome of pharmacological treatments for amphetamines abuse in clinical practice.
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To date, there are no systematic reviews that specifically show the effectiveness of pharmacological treatments alone or in combination with BCBT in treating Iranian amphetamine abusers. To date, there is no systematic review to specifically show the efficacy of BCBT for treating amphetamines abusers in the world. In other words, it is not documented how BCBT is efficacious for treating amphetamine abuse/use disorder alone or in combination with pharmacological treatments in other countries.
Clinical implications
Amphetamines are very powerful drugs that affect your central nervous system and how your brain interacts with your body. Amphetamines can be helpful to treat conditions like ADHD or narcolepsy. Talk with your healthcare provider if you feel like you are dependent on amphetamines or if they are not working to alleviate your symptoms. The ease of synthesis from inexpensive and readily available chemicals makes possible the wide-spread of amphetamine dependence and abuse. The objective of this review is to search and determine risks, benefits and costs for a variety of treatments for amphetamine dependence or abuse, psychosis and withdrawal.
What Is a Stimulant?
- The density of DAT sites on PFC dopaminergic neurones is very low (Hitri et al., 1991), and as a consequence, most dopamine that is released is sequestered via NET into noradrenergic neurones (Mazei et al., 2002; Morón et al., 2002; Stahl, 2003).
- Luckily, for reasons that are obscure, the recreational abuse methamphetamine has never really caught on in Europe, and almost all illegal use of the amphetamines is confined to d-amphetamine as the sulphate salt.
- Furthermore, using BCBT is likely to increase the outcome of pharmacological treatments for amphetamines abuse in clinical practice.
It is this imperative which causes drug abusers to progress from relatively safe methods of self-administration, such as oral ingestion, onto increasingly dangerous routes, for example snorting cocaine, smoking (‘crack’ cocaine or ‘crystal meth’) or intravenous injection. Another less well-recognised factor in drug abuse is a desire of users for instant gratification. Thus, the appeal of a particular drug as a recreational substance of abuse is to a large extent determined by its ability to produce its desired effects within minutes, for example the cocaine ‘rush’. Stimulants have a tendency to be liked by a certain proportion of the population, though not by everyone by any means. There is some evidence that basal dopamine tone determines this, with people who have a higher number of dopamine D2 receptors as measured by [11C]-raclopride positron emission tomography (PET) finding the stimulants aversive rather than pleasurable (Volkow et al., 1999a).
Treatment aims to help a person stop misusing drugs and improve their relationships with family, work, and society. Pharmacists can answer questions about medication and help people understand medication instructions. Because they are the primary people dispensing medications, they can watch for falsified prescriptions or drugs that people refill too often. A person should make sure that they take their prescription amphetamine addiction drugs as their doctor instructs and read any leaflet information to check for potential interactions with alcohol and other drugs. A person should only take medication that a doctor prescribes for them and should store their medications safely. These medications are part of the phenethylamine group, which includes drugs that can cause hallucinations, enhance a desire for social contact, or act as stimulants.
This limits the capacity to appropriately assess the risk versus benefit of the pharmacotherapies reviewed here. We elected to include studies in this review irrespective of safety reporting, to provide a comprehensive review of the current status of research. In men who have sex with men, the antidepressant mirtazapine reduced MA use and high-risk sexual behaviours, despite low medication adherence rates [30].
Can addiction be treated successfully?
Addiction happens when you use amphetamines to get high or improve performance. You are not able to control your use of it and you need it to get through daily life. Participating in a 12-step treatment program and getting individual counseling may reduce your chances of relapse and improve your chances for recovery.
- Peripheral vasodilators like nitroglycerin and nicardipine may be effective in lowering blood pressure.
- In terms of feasibility, amineptine has never been approved by the US Federal Drug Administration (FDA) and has been suspended in other jurisdictions due to hepatotoxic effects and abuse liability.
- These results are complemented by those of Ermer et al. (2011), who reported that the PK profiles were identical when lisdexamfetamine was administered intranasally or orally, indicating that attempts to increase its potential for recreational abuse by ‘snorting’ would similarly be futile.
- Study completion rates were low, with studies reporting the proportion of the sample who did not complete the protocol as 38.4% of the total randomised.
Types of amphetamines
If reported in the studies, secondary outcome measures were also considered for inclusion (see Box Box1).1). Those original RCTs without no clear description of the methods of a pharmacological treatment and/or BCBT and the modes of delivery were excluded. Studies were excluded if they used pharmacological treatments with other psychological and behavioral treatments. There are some suggested pharmacological medications for treating amphetamines abuse [4] which may be used alone or in combination with long-term behavioral interventions [5, 6]. However, using long-term behavioral interventions with pharmacological treatments has several important operational barriers to implementation [7]. Firstly, such behavioural interventions remain unaffordable for most patients [8].
What medications and devices help treat drug addiction?
This results in methamphetamine being present in the brain longer, which ultimately leads to prolonged stimulant effects. Bupropion was examined in six studies (14%) [26, 33, 39, 41, 60, 66]; four reported on AMPH/MA abstinence as the primary outcome, and two on reduction of AMPH/MA use. None of the six studies achieved a statistically significant difference in abstinence or reduction in use between the bupropion and placebo arm in planned primary outcome analyses. This list is not complete and many other drugs may affect amphetamine and dextroamphetamine.