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The once-a-month drug naltrexone was more effective at preventing drug relapse in ex-prisoners addicted to heroin and other opioids compared to the usual treatment modalities, including counseling and community treatment programs, according to results from a multisite, randomized trial led by researchers at the Center for Studies of Addiction at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and published online today in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Most people know that heroin is a dangerous drug, but its cousins, the legal, pharmaceutical opioids, such as codeine or hydrocodone, must be safe, right?

Experts take an in-depth look into a favorite college pastime by understanding the dangers and risks of alcohol.

In a recent study published in The Journal of Neuroscience, a research team led by Dr. Dorit Ron at the University of California, San Francisco examined whether a single exposure to alcohol can induce memory and behavioral changes that could promote future drinking.

Dr. Palamar and his team of researchers are the first to examine whether ecstasy users are unknowingly or unintentionally using “bath salts” and/or other novel psychoactive drugs.

Psychedelic drugs such as LSD hold promise for palliative care for an aging population, said University of Saskatchewan medical historian Erika Dyck.

With use of synthetic opioid “designer drugs” rising, scientists from The Scripps Research Institute have a new strategy to curb addiction and even prevent fatal overdoses, reporting successful preclinical tests of a vaccine that prevents the synthetic opioid fentanyl from reaching the brain.

Native Americans are more likely to abstain from alcohol than whites are, and heavy drinking and binge drinking rates are about the same for both groups, according to a UA study.

Proposals to restrict access to ketamine by making it a “Schedule I” drug would have a major impact on the availability of anesthesia and surgery in low- to middle-income countries (LMICs)–where ketamine is often the only general anesthetic drug available, according to a series of commentaries in Anesthesia & Analgesia.

A new study published in JAMA Internal Medicine looks at the relationship between lifetime marijuana use and cognitive function in middle-aged adults.