In the News

Injecting Painkiller Opana Can Lead to Serious Blood Disorder, FDA Warns

Syringe-pile Injecting the painkiller Opana ER can lead to a serious blood disorder that can result in kidney failure or death, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced recently.

Opana is an opioid that contains the ingredient oxymorphone, Reuters reports.

The drug is made by Endo Pharmaceuticals. Injecting Opana can cause thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura, which causes clots to form in small blood vessels throughout the body. These clots limit or block blood flow to the organs, the article explains.

Drug and Alcohol Use Common Years After Juveniles Released From Detention

Juvenile-Detention Researchers at Northwestern University in Chicago interviewed 1,200 males and more than 650 females, ages 10 to 18, who were being held at a juvenile detention center.

They were interviewed again several times, up to five years later. More than 45 percent of males and almost 30 percent of females had psychiatric disorders.

Alcohol and drug use were the most common and persistent psychiatric disorders, the study found.

While it has been known that psychiatric disorders are common among teenagers in detention, this is the first study to examine whether these disorders persisted in subsequent years, the researchers said.

Study to Examine Factors Behind Alcohol-Related Violence Within Intimate Relationships

relationship 3 Georgia State University's Dominic Parrott and Christopher Eckhardt at Purdue University in Indiana have received a five-year, $2.6 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to examine the underlying factors behind alcohol intoxication and violence between significant others and spouses.

Parrott and Eckhardt will undertake the study, supported by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) in what is the largest study of its kind.

"This is the first true study in the field to directly test our assumptions about how alcohol contributes to intimate-partner violence," said Parrott, an associate professor of psychology.

Proposed Changes to Prescription Drug Labels Designed to Reduce Medication Mix-ups

Drug-Warning-Label- The scientific nonprofit group that sets standards for medicine safety is proposing reworking and standardizing medication labels, in an effort to reduce potentially dangerous medication mix-ups.

The U.S. Pharmacopeial Convention (USP), is proposing to keep the drug name, clear patient instructions and dose prominently displayed in clear, large type at the top of the label, while placing less important information, such as the pharmacy name and drug quantity, away from dosing instructions.

The changes would do away with confusing instructions.

Drinking and Substance Abuse Among Women in the US on the Rise

Alcohol awareness month According to the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse, about six million women are dependent on alcohol in the U.S. and about 2.6 million women have substance abuse issues. It is hard to tell whether more women are abusing alcohol and other substance than in the past, because women have always felt stigmatized by their drinking and drug habits and are likely to keep their issues a secret.

It is important to note, though, that the number of arrests of women for DUI rose a startling 30 percent between 1998 and 2007, indicating that substance abuse is a growing problem among women.

What puts a woman at risk for developing a dependency on alcohol or drugs?

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