Talk:Substance-related disorder

Cited?
The fact that you have presented one group's opinion as fact does not mean that you can ask others not to change that. This page should reflect the fact that there is disagreement about what substance abuse is. Get a grip. Guttlekraw 00:17, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)
 * You have been asked to cite sources for the last week, and still, you refuse to do so. --Viriditas | Talk 00:19, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)
 * My God. What universe are you in? What sources do you want? Please, instead of a rant, simply state which part of this you want sources from. Everyone who has comented agrees with my edits except you. Guttlekraw 00:25, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)
 * It is not my job to find sources for your claims. You need to do the research. Please stop changing cited articles to reflect your own personal, POV. --Viriditas  | Talk 22:22, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

"Substance abuse is sometimes used as a synonym for drug abuse, drug addiction, and chemical dependency, but actually refers to the use of substances in a manner outside sociocultural conventions. All use of controlled drugs and all use of other drugs in a manner not dictated by convention (e.g. according to physician's orders or societal norms) is abuse according to this definition, however there is no universally accepted definition of substance abuse."

How do you abuse a substance? Does this include "abusing" food by getting fat? This article is based on opinion rather than fact. Even if citations are somehow found they will themselves be based on opinion. What drug does more harm has more to do with the person, how the drug is taken and cutting agents involved than the drug itself. Shooting milk into your veins will do more harm than than eating cannabis or opium. Does this make milk more harmful that heroin? This article was written by political person rather than a scientist. Would narcotics do the same amount of harm if they were not illegal in the first place? How do you do a scientific study on a drug when you have no clue what the cutting agents are and the environment is underground in some cases and controlled in others? When a drug is banned, research is limited to prohibitions organizations. Would the DEA allow unbiased studies on scheduled narcotics?--Cobra Control (talk) 17:22, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Harm reduction
Many people beleive that eliminating 'drug abuse' is either unachievable or not desireable, and that the best way to manage drug use is through education and provision of equipment and space for safe use of drugs. These approaches are known as harm reduction, and advocates typically believe that responsible recreational drug use can be managed without harm.

Medical treatment
Non-dietary substances entering the body can often have deleterious effects both acute and chronic. Furthemore, the addictive nature of most drugs limits the individual's ability to discontinue drug use even when experiencing these adverse health effects.

Medical treatment then centers on two aspects: 1) breaking the addiction, 2) treating the health problems.

Most countries have health facilities that specialize in the treatment of drug abuse, although access may be limited to larger population centers and the social taboos regarding drug use may make those who need the medical treatment reluctant to take advantage of it. For example, it is estimated that only fifteen percent of injecting drug abusers are in treatment relative to the total in need.

Access to treatment facilities for patients with substance use disorders is an issue of concern as drug abuse is recognized as a chronic brain disease in the form of substance abuse and dependence. Patients may require acute and long-term maintenance treatment and relapse prevention, complemented by suitable rehabilitation.

Therapy
The development of pharmacotherapies for drug abuse treatment are currently in progress. New immunotherapies (depot medications) that counteract the effects of drugs like cocaine, methamphetamine, phencyclidine, nicotine, and opioid dependence are being tested. Buprenorphine is one new option for the treatment of opioid addiction. Traditionally, new pharmacotherapies are quickly adopted in primary care settings, however, drugs for substance abuse treatment have faced many barriers. Naltrexone, a drug marketed under the name "ReVia," is a medication approved for the treatment of alcohol dependence. Unfortunately, this drug has reached very few patients. This may be due to a number of factors, including resistance by addiction treatment providers and lack of resources.

Legal treatment
Most countries in the world have lists of controlled substances, which are those substances that the society has deemed too harmful for individuals to exercise their individual choice to use. For controlled substances, the legal punishments for the creation, distribution, possession and even personal use can be quite severe (including death penalty in some countries). See Prohibition (drugs) and Arguments for and against drug prohibition for a more detailed treament of these subjects.

Despite the illegality of controlled substances, many very large, organized criminal drug cartels operate world-wide. Advocates of decriminalization argue that it is the illegality of these substances that is making drug dealing such a lucrative business.

Sociology of drug abuse
As well as being a major public health problem, drug abuse is also a social problem with far-reaching implications. Stress, poverty, domestic and societal violence, and various diseases (i.e., injecting drug users as a source for HIV/AIDS)  are spread by drug abuse. Studies have also shown that individuals dependent on illicit drugs experience higher rates of comorbid psychiatric syndromes. Drug abuse has also been associated with social isolation from friends and family.

OK, this is beyond what I can put up with.
You just destroyed two articles, replacing both with stubs that summarize your point of view. Stop this vandalism and discuss these radical controversial changes before you make them. Guttlekraw 14:48, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Defs
I suggest we start with something like this for defs: http://www.medterms.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=24405. Guttlekraw 14:51, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * I agree with this. I think the DSM def of abuse is a reasonable one and does not confuse the legal with the medical.  I agree that the def used by Talk on the Drug abuse page was somewhat arbitrary and POV. Osmodiar 18:27, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)
 * Guttlekraw seems to be misleading you. I have used the DSM definition of Substance abuse, while Guttlekraw has been changing cited definitions to reflect his POV.  The link Guttlekraw uses above is merely an abbrieviated version.  Please also look at the page history to view the data that Guttlekraw is removing.  The definition on the drug abuse page was a cite from Mosby's, and not invented out of thin air like the one posted by Guttlekraw. --Viriditas  | Talk 21:05, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)
 * No one is misleading me on this. I did read the history and Guttlekraw's contributions. Whether or not he has an agenda is irrelevant to this article, which should be able to stand on its own merit.  I am aware that the link he provided above was to the DSM definition.  I strongly support making the distinction between legal and clinical definitions clear. Osmodiar 04:25, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)
 * Guttlekraw hasn't made any contributions aside from manipulating cited text that I provided, so I believe you are being misled. He did not originally provide the link to the DSM definiton.  I am the one who provided the link here.  The problem with Webster's definition is that it basically restates the defintion for drug abuse, whereas Mosby and Mediline Encylclopedia discern between the two.  The distinction between legal and clinical definitions is being developed on the drug abuse page, however it should certainly be added here as well. --Viriditas  | Talk 05:02, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The word "dependence" probobly should not be in the definition as dependence has its own clinical definition. Osmodiar 04:28, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)
 * Your point is covered by the statement:  There are on-going debates as to the exact distinctions between substance abuse and substance dependence, but current practice standard distinguishes between the two by defining substance dependence in terms of physiological and behavioral symptoms of substance use, and substance abuse in terms of the social consequences of substance use. I will attempt to further clarify this as much as possible, and would appreciate any suggestions or contributions on your part. --Viriditas  | Talk 05:05, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)
 * I have altered the introduction in response to your criticism. --Viriditas | Talk 06:16, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)

In the comment above mine the definition in the quote does not make sence. Substance abuse is an old fashioned term used when the substance use is causing harm to the user. This harm could be medical, legal, sociological or financially etc. The modern term of 'problematic substance use' is much more Politically correct, easier to understand and is less widely used in the wrong way by people unaware of the proper definitions. This is a continuation of my arguments to change the name of this page to substance use or to leave a stub page on substance abuse and move anything relating to any other part of substance use like dependancy to another page. Delighted eyes 14:41, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Meaning obscured
Guttlekraw, be careful with your changes. We don't want to imply that the term substance abuse is something to be used lightly (ie. a term used to refer to unapproved use of a substance) when clearly by definition, substance abuse should only refer to detrimental abuse of a substance. Your removal of the word, "harmful" actually works against your efforts to justify recreational use. --Thoric 20:25, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Link from drug abuse
This page should be shown when searching for drug abuse. I am new here (just wrote my first article), can someone experienced do this? Plf515 03:33, 24 November 2006 (UTC)plf515
 * Sorry, I disagree. We are dealing with two different topics.  Drug abuse deals with a general overview of the overuse of drugs for nontherapeutic effects while substance abuse is a specific diagnostic classification of a mental disorder. I will create a dab header to highlight the difference. &mdash;Viriditas | Talk 05:05, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Something strange is happening. Today when I clicked on your link to drug abuse, an article appeared.  Yesterday, when I typed in drug abuse in search, it was blank, which is why I suggested linking from there to here.  I do agree there is room for at least two pages (I do work in substance abuse).

The only difference between 'drug abuse' and 'substance abuse' is that drug abuse is a non-politically correct term. Usually used by people who are unaware of the term substance. The term drug abuse also differs in its use due to peoples definition of what a drug is. The word 'drug' is often used by people when refering to substances which are illegal or have a stigma attached to there use. Drug abuse is some times used to not include alcohol or prescription medication as some do not see these as drugs but would understand that they are also substances. Drug abuse could be called a 'slang' term' or a general term used by the public or the media. The term 'drug abuse' is also used as it is more likely to strike fear due to its associations with hyperdermic needles etc.

I agree that the page drug abuse should stay as it is a common term but it should link straight to this page and the fact that it is not the professional or pc term used should be stated. Delighted eyes 14:21, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Substance vs. drug abuse
The section on substance abuse vs. drug abuse seems to conflict with the intro definition of the topic. Whether any use of illicit drugs is substance abuse or drug abuse is controversial. This section defines the use of illicit drugs as abuse simply because society and the law labels them illicit. The intro definition seems to refers to the "overindulgence in and dependence on a psychoactive" thus making not all use of illicit drugs as (if not overindulged) as substance abuse. Now if the medical communities believes that any use of illicit drugs is "overindulgence" then that ought to be made clear. Otherwise the two sections should be harmonized. Also the other terms mentioned in the section such a drug abuse and chemical dependency have various definitions depending on who is using them and thus may be synonyms for substance abuse or may not be. The section needs to be rewritten though I not sure how to rewrite best. --Cab88 06:59, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

There are many things wrong with ths page. I really think that this page should be called by the term which covers all types of use which is basicly 'substance use'. I have searched it and substance use does not seem to have a page. Under the heading substance use we could then give defininitions of the other terms also used and connected with substance use such as abuse, misuse, dependancy, addiction. It should be stated which are PC and which are not. The term substance abuse is quite old fashioned and it has been replaced by the term 'problematic substance use'. There are reasons why language changes and wikpedia should be kept up to date.

I do not wish to critasise anybodies work but I would ask that this page is done by proffesionals in the field such as myself so that the public are not misinformed. At the moment parts of the page contradict themselves and this needs changing.

It also needs to be kept in mind that the USA, the UK and other parts of the world have different substance use policies so anything.

I am going to have a look through now and se what is easy for me to change but i don't have a lot of time. At the moment all I like about this page is the definitions given in the lower section. have changed some sections and tidied up plus repaired some vandalism Delighted eyes 14:31, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Merge to Drug addiction
See Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Medicine for discussion. Mikael Häggström (talk) 08:48, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Merge tag removed. I've read the discussion and can see no useful purpose in merging this page. &mdash;Viriditas | Talk 12:22, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

SAMSHA link
Why was this link removed ? It had nothing to do with DMOZ which had been there before. -- (Bob) Wikiklrsc (talk) 15:09, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

Unsectioned/signed stuff from top of page
Moved this stuff to clean up page - Shamanchill (talk) 01:24, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Why was the link to Dave Mustaine removed?


 * Hi there Christal, just wanted to point out that medical and legal authorities funadamentally disagree on what abuse is. For example, most US jurisdictions and medical authorities tend to include use of illicit drugs as abuse, whereas europeans tend not to classify use of illicit drugs as abuse unless it is harmful to the user or others. Of course, we all agree that there is no agreement over time about what abuse is, and that different countries classify which drugs are illicit differently. I'd appreciate it if you could work with me on this instead of simmply reverting. Thanks, You guys and do not smoke it's bad for you and don't do violent things or abuse, harm or anything. just don't do it!

Drug/substance abuse distinction
Not sure I am getting the drug/substance abuse distinction Does a perceived need for some such distinction arise from the fact that some drugs are within the scope of drug control laws while others are not? Does it imply that drug abuse is controlled drug abuse and substance abuse encompasses, also, abuse of other drugs? Laurel Bush (talk) 15:15, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Editing
I edited contributions made by User:HDurr47. They failed to correctly cite their content, so I cleaned that up for them. Ndrysdale2 (talk) 21:22, 8 October 2011 (UTC)