Category: From Newswise – Substance Abuse

An analysis of electronic health records of nearly 580,000 fully vaccinated people in the United States found that while the risk of SARS-CoV-2 breakthrough infection among those with substance-use disorders was low overall, it was higher for people who misuse substances such as alcohol, tobacco, marijuana and opioids.

Join the Fielding School’s UCLA Center for Health Policy Research (UCLA CHPR) as the center brings together public health leaders, community advocates, policymakers, and other thought leaders to help identify past successes and lessons learned, so that California can invest effectively with evidence-based solutions to creating a healthier, more prosperous California for all.

Cedars-Sinai is joining a nationwide study to investigate how children’s development is impacted by biological and environmental exposures, especially to opioids, marijuana, alcohol and tobacco, before and shortly after birth. The goal is to develop insights that can inform public policy to improve the health of children across the nation.

With fewer people on the road during the early days of the pandemic, more drivers were speeding and driving recklessly, resulting in more crashes being deadly, a new study found.

The U.S. is seeing an increased use of cannabis resulting from its legalization for recreational purposes, according to a study conducted at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health.

A research team recently completed county-level assessments of 10 states, highlighting the communities most at risk for a spike in opioid overdose deaths and identifying areas where services for opioid users are lacking. The results for Indiana appear in a paper in Preventive Medicine Reports.

New report published in Drug and Alcohol Dependence demonstrates how phone sensor data, such as GPS, can be used to detect cannabis intoxication in young adults.

With the reintroduction of powerful narcotic opioids to manage acute pain, surgery can be a make-or-break time for patients in recovery from opioid use disorder (OUD). For those using buprenorphine as part of their recovery process, the stress, anxiety and risk can be amplified if, as is often the case, they are directed to stop using the buprenorphine ahead of their surgery.

While many parents and caregivers involved in the child welfare system suffered trauma as children, new research suggests that those with substance misuse issues as adults may have had particularly difficult childhoods.

Physicians prescribed opioids more often to their white patients who complained of new-onset low back pain than to their Black, Asian and Hispanic patients during the early days of the national opioid crisis, when prescriptions for these powerful painkillers were surging but their dangers were not fully apparent.