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INTRODUCTION

I choose this topic especially for us teens we realize how dangerous and

addictive drugs are.

At the time are being consumed by most teenagers, some are addicts and

others die being consumed by his addiction.

Usually people use drugs because they want to change something in their

lives to be accepted, to escape or relax, to relieve boredom, to be mature, to

be rebellious, to experiment.

They think that drugs are a solution. But eventually, the drugs become the

problem. The consequences of drug use are always worse than the problem

one tries to solve them.

Addictions often arise from problems within the family (misunderstanding,

miscommunication, shock, intra-family abuse, rejection, stepparents,

neglect, lack of funding, school difficulties, absolute poverty and heartbreak)

to feel that they are ones at home, teens have the impression of not being

heard or considered.

Sometimes young people with an unhealthy curiosity, by observing that

some teens her age mimic the act to try and feel the use of any drug. Also

some drugs such as inhalants, are easily accessible to them, are authorized

and sold at low cost at any supply, causing consumer advantage.

It is very important to know everything about drugs and we should always be

aware of them and maintain the position of saying NO. For that is our

decision.

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DRUGS

What are drugs?

With the drug name it is designated in generic sense to all mineral substance,

vegetable or animal that it is used in the industry or in the medicine and that it

possesses stimulating effects, depressors or narcotics or, like it establishes the

World Organization of the Health (OMS), to any substance that, introduced in an

alive organism, it can modify an or several of their functions. To penal effects, the

drug (in spite of the different performance forms in the organism) concept also

includes the stupefying substances and psychotropic, natural or synthetic, whose

reiterated consumption provokes the physical or organic dependence, as well as

the uncontrollable desire to continue consuming them in more dose in order to

avoid the syndrome of abstinence.

OMS mentions:

The main stimulant drugs are: cocaine, the amphetamines, the methilfenidas, the

fenometrazina and others that, be already inhaled, puffs of smoke or injected, they

produce increment in the alert, excitement, euphoria, increase of the heart pulse

and the sanguine pressure, insomnia.

The depressive substances, as the barbiturates, the benzodiazepinas, the

alcohol and the methaqualona, they provoke difficulty when speaking,

disorientation, staggering when walking and intoxication.

Narcotics are used in medicine, among them are opium, morphine, codeine,

heroin, methadone and others and among its effects are euphoria, dizziness,

decreased respiratory rate and nausea.

The hallucinogens are substances that produce illusions, hallucinations, altered

perceptions of the body and of the reality and emotional a lot of excitement. LSD is

among those most used ones, the mushrooms, the mescaline, the peyote and

other more.

Another type of addictive substances is the cannabinoides, as the marijuana or

the hashish that cause euphoria, desinhibición, increment of the appetite,

deterioration of the memory and of the attention.

The characteristics of the drugs make them extremely hazardous substances. The

effects produced in the body are not always equal and vary according to the class

of drugs, for example, some are stimulants and other, depressing. Also vary

with the dose for the same drug can cause different effects depending on the

amount consumed.

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These effects are related with each person's characteristic psychophysical and with

the particularities of the mean in that the consumption takes place. For these

reasons, certainty never exists but probability that the drug produces the looked for

effect.

Addiction is the imperious necessity to consume drug regularly (not to be able to

moderate the consumption or to suppress it). It´s comes determined by psychic

and physical phenomena.

Tachyphylaxis is the necessity to consume dose every bigger time to get the

same effects. They present it many pharmaceuticals because the organism

develops its mechanisms of degradation of the substance, but to the drugs a

phenomenon is added of 'tolerance' psychological.

The squares of abstinence are always psychological and, in the case of some

drugs, they are also physical syndromes that can be mortal. They can be controlled

with therapeutic symptomatic measures or substitutes (less noxious substances, of

similar effects that retire progressively).

There are legal and socially admitted and promoted drugs and other illegal.

The tobacco, the coffee, the alcoholic drinks, the industrial solvents and the drugs

are among the legal ones. The marijuana, the cocaine, the heroine, the

amphetamines, etc are among the illegal.

CAUSES OF ADDICTION

Family problems

The adolescents when living a crisis stage and when being about avoiding the

problems, they look for easy exits or you form of forgetting them, for example by

means of the alcohol and the drugs.

Many times the addictions arise for problems inside the family (incomprehension,

lack of communication, blows, intra-family abuse, rejection, stepfathers,

abandonment, lack of economic resources, school difficulties, absolute poverty and

indifference), when feeling that they are not wanted in the homes, the adolescents

have the impression of not being listened or taken into account.

Caen in an error when being about solving the conflicts by means of the drugs,

believing that they will only ingest once the substance, but in fact it is generated

the habit or the addiction, this causes that the family problems increase, since the

consumed drug is stronger, and when not wanting or to be able to leave it, the

adolescents sometimes opt to abandon the home, transforming into children of the

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street, in which they are exposed to risks of great magnitude like to contract

illnesses, to be hit, to support abuses, exploitation, hunger and abandonment.

Influence social

They also appeal to the drugs when they show up problems around in its. For

example: When not being accepted by the friends or a condition to enter to certain

group it is ingesting drug, to be as them, to imitate them, to make them believe that

"the trips" are the maximum thing, or the worst thing, to fall in the social influence.

The addicts can make the comments that you want on the person that is not willing

to enter in the drugs; the adolescents should be very aware of themselves and to

maintain their posture of NOT saying.

To be problematic can be cause of the influence of the partners, as making them

fall in the delinquency. Since the robberies that are carried out by addicts, are not

primarily for issues of hunger, but for the necessity of to continue being drugged.

This causes to have problems with the authorities and later on to be subjected to

the jails.

Curiosity

Sometimes young people with an unhealthy curiosity, to observe that some

adolescents of their age imitate the act of to prove and to feel the use of any drug.

Also some drugs as the inhaling ones are of easy access for them, they are

authorized and sold at low cost in any supply, what causes consumption

advantage.

When accepting the organism the tranquility and relaxation of the effect of the

drug, it causes that this demands the consumption again, but with the same dose it

is already insufficient, that makes increase more and more the quantity to feel the

same effects, opening the way to the addiction. Some young that experience

feeling of well-being or the simple one made of "walking in a trip" and that when

consuming the drug their organism it rejects them in an abrupt way, in general

these people don't attempt it again.

Why young people use drugs and children?

If you can understand some of the following reasons of the reason a boy or young

can fall in the use of the drugs, it will be much easier to be able to chat their

children about the problem.

When you wonder to the children or adolescents that have used drugs reason do

they make it? They respond us:

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As revelion form toward people.

To feel that it is belonged to a group, gang or club.

Because they like risks.

Because they find amusing.

Because it is in fashion.

To be part of the amusement in the parties.

Because you makes you feel bigger.

As escape of the pressures of the modern life.

To feel boring.

Because once "inside of", it is very difficult to be left.

CONSEQUENCES

The consumption of drugs, legal and illegal, constitutes a problem of public very

important health. The risks and damages associated to the consumption vary for

each substance.

Also, it is necessary to keep in mind the personal variables as the grade of

knowledge or the user's experience, their motivation, etc. and the specific

properties of each drug as well as the influence of the adulterant elements.

That makes that an addiction is a noxious addiction it is that becomes against

oneself and of the other ones. At the beginning certain apparent bonus is obtained,

the same as with a habit.

But earlier than it takes their behavior begins to have negative consequences in

their life. The addictive behaviors produce pleasure, relief and other short term

compensations, but they provoke pain, disaster, desolation and multitude of

problems to half term. The negative consequences associated to the addictions

affect too many aspects different from the life of a person. These consequences

are very diverse and they can group in two big groups:

By type

Health: the consumption of drugs originates or it intervenes in the appearance of

diverse illnesses, damages, damages and organic and psychological problems.

For example: Hepatitis, Cirrhosis, cardiovascular Dysfunctions, Depression,

Psychosis, Paranoia, etc.

Psychic health: The addicts usually suffer a wide range of psychological

dysfunctions, as negative states of spirit and irritability, defensive attitudes, loss of

self-esteem and intense blame feelings.

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Physical Health: The addiction usually bears multitudes of physical symptoms

appearance including dysfunctions of the appetite, ulcer, insomnia, and tires, more

the physical dysfunctions and illnesses provoked in particular by each substance.

Social: The addicts to drugs are often involved in assaults, public disorder, racial

conflicts, marginalization, etc.

When you begin to need more to the drugs than to other people they can be ruined

or to be destroyed the intimate relationships and to get lost the friendships. One

can stop to participate in the world, to abandon goals and plans, to stop to grow as

person, not to try to solve the problems constructively and to appeal to more drugs

as "solution."

Relate: The relationship with the family, friends or couple loses temper, frequent

discussions appear, sexual indifference, the communication is interrupted, there

are loss of trust, estrangement, etc.

Work: When a person has an addiction usually subtracts the time to her work to

look for the drug or to recover of her use, you usually arrives late, there are smaller

productivity, deterioration of the quality of the work or loss of the own work.

Behavior: As to get and to use the drug has become almost more important that

any other thing, the addicts become selfish and egocentric: they don't care nobody

more than themselves.

Depending on the level

Singular: they are the damages experienced by the own consumer of drugs.

Community: the consumption of drugs generates multitude of negative

consequences for the addict's family, on the friends, the neighbors, etc.

Society: in the society it produces effects on the structure and organization of the

same one (I increase of the demands in the services of health, increment of the

civic insecurity for crimes against the property, witnesses of the organized crime

through the nets of drug dealers.

Effects of the drug in the family:

Frequently the members of the family cease of acting in functional form when they

are about fighting with the problems taken place by the drug in a to be wanted,

some refuse that some problem exists, blocking their own feelings (in a same way

that the addict to the drug). Another of the members of the family is about hiding

the errors made by the addict to the drug. The concealment happens when a

member of the family rescues the addict or he helps him in the obtaining of the

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drug. One of the spouses maybe is about hiding the children the addiction to their

couple's drug.

SIGNS OF ADDICTION

All addictions are diagnosable because its symptoms can be recognized and

described. However, it is often difficult and costly to accept a person who has an

addiction problem, which is why it's best to leave that addiction, is 'self-diagnosed'.

Regrettably, the addict is usually the last in finding out his own problem, due to a

denominated defense mechanism 'negation.'

The 4 cardinal signs / symptoms of the addiction are:

Obsession:

The addictive behavior is, in general, urgent and obsessive. When it is addicted

often one cannot think of another thing that it is not the drug, the way of getting it,

the form of administering it, etc. In general, the addiction is lived as an obsession

that will direct great part of its time, its energy and its attention.

The lifestyle becomes monotonous and 'unimodal': everything rotates around the

addiction, and the rest of people, things, interests, obligations... it passes to a

secondary plan.

Negative consequences:

That makes that an addiction is a noxious addiction it is that becomes against

oneself and of the other ones. At the beginning certain apparent bonus is obtained,

the same as with a habit. But earlier than it takes their behavior begins to have

negative consequences in their life.

Control lack:

The distinctive feature of the addictive behavior is that when being about

controlling it, the will is insufficient. The substance or activities in question control

the person, instead of being on the contrary. The false self-control perception is

one of the big paradigms to understand the addictions. The addicts believe that

they can control the drug: the quantity, the doses, the frequency, etc. however

anything is more mistaken than this belief.

To think that one possesses certain omnipotence in front of the drugs is an

ingenuousness, and stiller when consumption antecedents already exist. If for

people teetotallers it is difficult to control the ingestion of alcohol, for people that

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have a consumption history and/or abuse of alcohol is very difficult to stop, to not

say or to avoid a situation.

Negation:

As the addicts begin to accumulate problems (in the work, home, socially),

inevitably they begin to deny two things:

• That the drug or activity in question constitutes a problem that they

cannot control

• That the negative effects in their lives have some connection with the

use of the drug or activity.

As the negation it is a mental fictitious process, to deny the own addiction or their

consequences means, literally, to be outside of contact with the reality.

• The negation assumes many forms:

• To deny absolutely: 'No, I don't have any problem'

• To minimize: 'Not it is so serious'

• To avoid the topic completely (to ignore it, to refuse to approach it or to

deviate the attention to another topic)

• To accuse others: 'Who this would not make in my situation'

• To rationalize: 'Him mine is not so serious', 'I am not so hooked'

TYPES OF ADDICTION

Each substance takes place in the organism diverse effects, but these can vary

according to its administration.

It is necessary to consider that the use of any substance necessarily supposes the

appearance of problems for the consumer. This use can be merely incidental, with

an experimental objective or in a certain moment of the individual's history, and not

to carry modifications in its personality, in the operation of its nervous system or in

its lifestyle. The repetition of these experimental or incidental uses what you/they

can lead to dependence.

For general rule, the use and abuse of drugs can generate dependence due to the

phenomenon of the neuroadaptation. This consists on a permanent (but reversible)

change of the structure and operation of the neurons on which the effect s of the

located drugs.

In more complex levels, there are other mechanisms of adaptation: emotional,

behavioral, cognitive, relational, etc. The changes that take place in a person for

the use of drugs are not limited to the mere action of the substance on the nervous

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cell, but rather it supposes a transformation that is defined in the mark of the

relationship among the individual, the substance and the context.

The consumption patterns are a group of variables that define the relationship

between the individuals and self-administered substance. This way, you can

consider:

What substance it is the main drug

How other drugs show up associate

Which the roads are for the one that are administered (oral, injected puff of

smoke, inhaled, and others).

what is commonly consumed quantities

In what physical state the consumption takes place

If the administration takes place in form singular or in the mark group

In what period storm the consumption takes place

What you average of behavior they go associate

What norms and values exercise from cultural support to the consumption

Experimental consumption

It corresponds to the situations of contact initial with an or several substances, of

which it can spend to an abandonment of the same ones or the continuity in the

consumption.

The adolescence is the stage in that most often this consumption type arises,

although a high percentage doesn't backslide in the same one.

The motivations can be several: curiosity, pressure of the group, attraction of that

prohibited and of the risk, search of the pleasure and of that ignored, and I

increase of the offer, among other.

As evaluation indicators to define this consumption type is considered that the

individual ignores the effects of the substance and that his consumption is carried

out, generally, in the mark of a group that he invites him to prove it.

Occasional consumption

It is the intermittent use of the substances, without any fixed rhythm and with long

intervals of abstinence.

Among the main motivations facilitate the communication, the search of pleasure,

relaxation, and to transgress the norms, among other.

Some general characteristics that define this consumption type are: the individual

continues using the substance in group, although it is able to carry out the same

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activities without necessity of drugs; he already knows the action of the same one

in his organism and for this reason it consumes it.

Habitual consumption

It supposes a frequent use of the drug. This practice can lead to the other

consumption forms, depending on the substance, the frequency with which it is

used, the person's characteristics, the environment that surrounds him, etc.

Among the motivations expressed to maintain the use of the drugs they are: to

intensify the sensations of pleasure; experience of belonging and need for

recognition within it; to mitigate the solitude, the boredom, the anxiety; to reaffirm

independence or aversion toward the society, and to reduce the hunger, the cold,

the weakness or the fatigue.

Some indicators that define this consumption form are: the fellow enlarges the

situations in those that it appeals to the drugs; these are used so much individually

as in group; his effects are perfectly well-known and looked for by the user. Since

you have not lost control over their behavior, manifested to quit if unintentionally.

Abusive consumption

The individual needs the substance and all its life rotates around this in spite of the

complications that it can cause it.

Recurrent consumption of drugs that carries the nonfulfillment of obligations in the

work, the school or at home (absences repeated or low yield; suspensions or

expulsions of the school; I neglect of the children or of the obligations of the

house).

Recurrent use of drugs in situations in which it is physically dangerous (driving a

car or operating machinery). Legal problems reiterated with the substance (arrests

for scandalous behavior).

Continued substance use despite recurrent social problems or interpersonal

trouble caused or exacerbated by the effects of drugs (discussions with the wife

about the consequences of the intoxication, physical violence, etc.).

STAGES OF ADDICTION

The drugs, all the drugs, present an expensive double. First appear with the

positive, favorable image and that so much attracts to young and bigger. Later on,

that face disappears. Quickly the drugs begin to be shown just as they are: pain,

problems, misery and multiple dysfunctions.

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In this duality that the drugs present part of the potential difficulty it resides to avoid

new people to consummate them and abuse of them. If from the beginning, the

prevailing face was the negative, the attractiveness and mystic that it surrounds the

world of the drugs it would disappear.

In many senses the addiction process has been compared with the one of

beginning a relationship; but in this case it would be about an unhappy relationship.

As we cross the successive stages, the commitment is intensified and the influence

that exercises on the addict becomes stronger.

In function of this analogy Dr. Arnold M. Washton in their book to Not Want is to be

able to it establishes five stages in the addiction process.

Amorousness

The first experiences with the drugs usually leave a recorded mark. If this first

contact has been pleasant, he takes place an amorousness or passionate

attraction take the substance again or to carry out the activity. This distorted

perception of the reality, however, it moves, it produces euphoria or it tranquilizes

that makes increase the probability there to be a new taking or occasion to

consume. It takes place a change of state of spirit that, in many cases, it is

experienced at visceral (everything caused it by the logical alteration of the

cerebral chemistry) level and that it generates that glare the same as one falls in

love with a girl or boy.

In the game, an initial strong gain increases the probabilities of acquiring addiction

to the game.

Betrayal

However, what one glimpses during the honeymoon is not it that in fact obtains.

With the step of the time, it is betrayed. This way, besides the deterioration

suffered in the main spheres of their life, it is very probable that the addict is

making things that he would not make usually, for maintain his addiction (to steal,

to participate in other illicit activities). The artificial paradise that is promised in the

previous phase turn into dark alleys filled with traps. The betrayal is real and the

decline begins.

In the ruin

Now the addict should consume more and more to avoid that the growing feelings

and negative states of spirit deepen in his conscience and to be about maintaining

the positive effects that every time is smaller. It is developing tolerance and has to

consume doesn't stop to obtain pleasure or relief but to avoid the uneasiness

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associated to the syndrome of abstinence. The physical dependence created

chemically by the action of the substance on the nervous system has captured the

individual. Psychologically, the confrontation strategy developed up to now

continues staying with that which, the problems far from being been solved

increase even more.

Trapped

With the time, the addict arrives to a desperation state in his relationship with the

substance or addictive activity, leaving aside everything the rest. He behaves of

more and more impulsive way and uncontrolled prisoner of their addiction. This

stage of the addictive relationship is a descent to the desperation and the personal

destruction. The subservience to drugs does not allow truce and tends to self-

perpetuate this spiral, unless something that stops it happens. The return

nevertheless exists, although it is also a process hard and difficult.

TREATMENT

The treatment for the addiction consists on a series of clinical structured

interventions in such a way that are useful to promote and to support the recovery

of a person affected by the addiction toward a better quality of life.

The treatment is individualized

Each person is a human being different with different situations of life and different

necessities. For this reason each treatment should be individualized so that the

best thing is adapted possible to each person's contextual characteristics.

To harness the person that will talk to the appropriate treatment is a key factor in

the final success of the treatment, just as they indicate it the investigations recent

envelope the topic (I Project MATCH)

The treatment is a process

The initial consultation, the evaluation, the diagnosis, the intervention and the

treatment in themselves are parts of a process that not this fractured in stages but

rather it is part of a continuum of care, where the phases transicionan so that some

are overlapped others. To understand this reality is important to be able to take the

relevant decisions at each moment of the process

Principles about the treatment

LEl National Institute of Alcohol and Drugs of USA have elaborated an excellent

pamphlet on the treatment of which we recommend their reading. In this section we

have picked up the beginning on the treatment that recojen the discoveries that

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have been made through practices it clinic and the investigations about the

treatment.

Treatment Plan Design

Keeping in mind the necessities and each person's individual characteristics the

treatment plan is designed that should be product besides the consent of those

implied in the process (usually the patient and the professional). This way one has

a document it bases that it serves as guide for the changes that are had like goals

of the recovery. In this section we study the details of the process of design of the

treatment plan.

Components of the treatment

The components are modules or tools that are to our disposition to integrate them

in the treatment plan. Here they show up the diverse classes of components that

are usually used for the treatment of the addictions:

1. Picosociales components

2. Pharmacological components

3. Components of self-help

4. Alternative therapies

The combination of these components can also be in function of the politicians of

the treatment institution, the readiness in the area of the resource, of the patient's

capacity to obtain the resource and of the disposition grade that the patient has to

follow the medical recommendations.

Principles of the Effective Treatments

1. Not there is a single treatment that is appropriate for all the people.

It is very important to achieve an appropriate combination of the atmosphere type,

the interventions and the services of treatments with the problems and the

necessities peculiar of each individual, so that this person achieves the final

success returning to work productively in the family, the work and the society.

2. The treatment should be easily available in all moment.

Since addicted people to the drugs can have doubts on if to begin or not a

treatment, is very important to take advantage of the opportunity when they

indicate that they are clever to receive treatment. It can get lost to potential

candidates for treatment if these treatments are not available immediately or if they

are not easily accessible.

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3. The effective treatment should embrace the person's multiple necessities,

not only its use of drugs.

To be effective, the treatment should go to the use of the person's drugs besides

any medical, psychological, social, vocational and legal other problem.

4. The plan of the patient's treatment should be continually evaluated and, of

being the case, modified to assure that the plan stays at the same time with the

changes in the person's necessities. A patient can require combinations of

services and components of treatments that vary during the course of her

treatment and recovery. Besides the advice or psychotherapy, the patient can

sometimes need medications, other medical services, family therapy, instruction to

be better parents, vocational rehabilitation and social and legal services. It is

essential that the treatment form is appropriate for the age, the sex, the ethnic

group and the patient's culture.

5. So that the treatment is effective, it is essential that the patient continues

him during an appropriate period of time.

The appropriate duration of the treatment for a person depends on its problems

and necessities. The investigations indicate that in most of the patients you begin

to see a significant improvement after three months of treatment. When you arrive

to this point, the additional treatments can achieve a quick recovery. Since many

people frequently leave the treatment prematurely, the programs should include

strategies that commit and maintain the patient’s low treatment.

6. The individual therapy or of group and other types of behavior therapies

constitute critical components of the effective treatment for the addiction.

During the therapy, the patients treat their motivation problems, they develop

abilities to reject the use of the drug, they replace activities where the drugs are

used by constructive and useful activities in those that the use of drugs doesn't

enter, and they improve their aptitudes to solve problems. The behavior therapy

also facilitates the interpersonal relationships and it improves the individual's ability

to work inside the family and of the community.

7. For many patients, the medications form an important element of the

treatment, especially when they combine with the different therapy types.

Methadone and levo-alpha-acetyl (LAAM) they are very effective to help those

addicted individuals to the heroine and other narcotics to stabilize their lives and to

reduce the use of illegal drugs. The naltrexona is also an effective medication for

addicted people to the opium and for some patients that at the same time suffer

from dependence to the alcohol. For addicted people to the nicotine, the products

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that replace to the nicotine (as the patches or chewing gums) or an oral (as the

bupropión) medication can be component effective of their treatment. While the

combination of treatments and of medications it can be of supreme importance for

patient with mental dysfunctions.

8. In the case of individuals with addiction problems or abuse of drugs that at

the same time have mental dysfunctions, it should be the two problems in an

integrated way.

As often addiction dysfunctions and mental dysfunctions are come in oneself

individual, those patients that present anyone of the two conditions should be

evaluated and treaties for the simultaneous presence of the other dysfunction type.

9. The medical detoxification is only the first stage of the treatment for the

addiction and for itself recently to change the long term use of drugs.

The medical detoxification manages the physical sharp symptoms of the syndrome

of the abstinence that happen carefully when one stops to use some drug.

Although the detoxification for itself rarely is enough to help addicted people to

achieve long term abstinence, for some individuals it is good as a strongly suitable

precursor for the effective treatment of the drug addiction.

10. The treatment doesn't have to be voluntary to be effective. The treatment

process can be facilitated thanks to a strong motivation. The sanctions or the

prizes inside the family, of the labor atmosphere or of the system of criminal justice

they can increase the percentages of individuals that enter significantly and that

they stay inside treatment programs for the drug addiction as well as the success

of the same ones.

11. The possible use of drugs during the treatment should be constantly

supervised.

During the period of treatment they can have relapsed to the use of drugs. The

objective supervision of the use of drugs and alcohol during the treatment,

including analysis of the urine or other exams, can help the patient to resist their

impulses of using drugs. This supervision class can also provide an early evidence

of the use of drugs so that the plan of the patient's treatment can be readjusted. To

give to know the results from the reports to the patients that register positively in

the analyses of drugs, can serve as an important element in the supervision.

12. The treatment programs should include exams for the HIV / AIDS, the

hepatitis b and c, the tuberculosis and other infectious illnesses, jointly with the

necessary therapy to help the patients to modify or to change those behaviors that

put to them or others in risk of being infected. The therapy can help the patients to

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avoid behaviors of high risk. Can also help people that are already infected to

manage their illness.

13. The recovery of the addiction can be a long term process and frequently it

requires multiple beats of treatments. Just as in other chronic illnesses, the

repetition in the use of drugs can happen during or after successful beats of

treatment. The patients can require treatments lingering and multiple beats of

treatments to be able to achieve the long term abstinence and a totally

reestablished operation Participation in self-help programs during and after

treatment provides support for maintaining abstinence.

RECOVERY

Treatment and Recovery:

While the recovery is the process by means of which the addict stops his use and it

produces positive changes in his lifestyle, the treatment is defined like a series of

clinical structured activities that they are used with the purpose of helping the

addict to recognize and to stop the active addiction; as well as to promote and to

maintain the sustained recovery.

It is necessary to clarify the relationship among these two processes that behave in

a harmonic and coordinated way.

The recovery is it stops a lifetime and its objective is the one of improving the

quality of the addict's life in recovery.

The treatment this defined to a period of time, although it could be several

necessary treatment sessions throughout the addict's life.

The objective of the treatment is to be able to attend the patient to achieve its

recovery.

The family intervention is a procedure directed to be able to help the addict to

make the enter decision in recovery. This intervention should be guided by a

trained professional and it is based on the power of the family like group of positive

pressure.

The clinical intervention can also be effective to begin the recovery process. Many

times the first contact with the treatment makes it the addict to treat some

secondary complication to the use. For example a sharp gastritis in the alcoholism,

or a venereal illness in the addict to the sex. If in that moment the appropriate

addiction diagnosis is made it is more probable than a recommendation of specific

treatment is made for the addiction. But many times the diagnosis is not made by

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the lack of training that exists in the professions of help in this area of the treatment

of the addictions.

It is advisable to be advised with a professional of the addiction that is trained in

this area and fulfill the requirements to be able to be of help.

Even so it is not necessarily indispensable the intervention professional because

many addicts recovers without necessity of having contact with the system of

health.

It even exists a lot of ignorance in the professional community about the topic of

the addiction, but there is also a population, every time but big, of professionals

that are committed with the training, the upgrade and the quality of the necessary

attention to work in the area of the treatment of the addictions.

On the other hand, it is necessary to keep care and since wisdom, there is always

a sector of humbugs that take advantage of the desperation of the families that

suffer of the addiction to deceive with false promises or magic "cures."

Not quick or magic "cures" exist; the simple one made of proposing them denotes

a gross ignorance of the topic. That attitude is also in fact the center of the mental

dynamics of the addiction: the obsessive search of the quick arrangement, the

magic substance, the person, place or thing that it will "fix" us the life The treatment

of the addictions should be integral, systemic and strategic approaching the

biggest quantity in levels possible: personal, family, work, social, etc.; and it should

be kept in mind to the person in an integral and complete way.

The psychosocial changes are the focus where the biggest quantity in treatment

energy will be invested, because it is there where the possibility of constructive

change is bigger.

The therapeutic different tools can and they should be used in an integral way and

keeping in mind each person's special necessities, but never as substitute of the

psychosocial treatment.

Not they exist better treatments that other but rather each person has different

necessities and each treatment modality offers different possibilities. Each plan of

individual treatment should be based on the severity of the addictive process, the

person's individual characteristics and the situation of psychosocial operation in

that moment.

The groups of self-help are treatment modalities that have been successful

throughout the time and they are always advisable especially in the maintenance

stage.

DRUGS PAGE 18

The studies demonstrate that a balanced plan made up of attendance to groups of

self-help and professional tracing, it is the most effective therapy, in the patients

that don't need to be interned.

Stages of the Recovery

The recovery process can be divided in stages, for its study and understanding.

These stages are based on the evolutionary "pattern of the recovery" of Gorski.

Each one of these stages takes I get a basic necessity of the recovery process,

and it is associated to a series of tasks that assure that the recovery stays in

March.

1. Transition: In this stage the basic task is to allow going the control necessity

on the use, either of substances, in the chemical addictions, or of addictive

behaviors in the behavioral ones.

2. Stabilization: In this phase the whole energy is focused in recovering of the

harmful effects that the compulsive use has had about the person's life in

recovery.

3. Early Recovery: In this phase the first internal changes take place, of

thought, feelings and attitude with regard to the use.

4. Half Recovery: Here the external changes take place. The repair of the

lifestyle damaged by the addiction and the development of a healthier and

balanced lifestyle.

5. Advanced Recovery: This stage this defined one for the overcoming of the

emotional matters and pending relatives that come from the upbringing,

childhood and adolescence.

6. Maintenance: This stage is based on the capacity to maintain a balanced life

and a personal continuous growth.

All these stages overcome some to other and an exact definition that separates

some of other, doesn't really exist but they work to be able to be located in the

pertinent tasks to the moment that one lives in the recovery.

The Relapse Process

The addiction, as chronic illness is associated with a natural tendency to the

relapse. That doesn't mean that it is unavoidable or appropriate to have relapses,

but rather they are a reality, and the best form of preventing them, it is accepting

the risk and knowing the process of the relapse well, also syndrome called relapse.

One of the most common misconceptions is that relapse is just around the use.

Although this is partially certain, in fact is called relapse to the whole process (1)

that takes from a state of sustained abstinence (2), until the consumption or active

DRUGS PAGE 19

addiction (3). This process happens throughout the time (4) and it is manifested

like a series of symptoms or changes that are in fact regressions to the old

behavior patterns and thought that had already been overcome.

Usually this process this formed by risky small decisions (5) that the person takes,

and that, connected some with other, go taking to build the one on the way to the

relapse. These small decisions, calls also "decisions of relative" risk (5), they are

seemingly without importance, but their effect is accumulative and they go taking to

the addict toward a situation impossible to resist (7), where it will be unavoidable

the use, because the susceptibility margins are surpassed. An imaginary line, or

no-return line exists (6) after which is not possible to give it goes behind to the

search behavior and the use is imminent. Even this way in the transition area

among the line of I don't return and the use, the relapse is primarily behavioral and

of attitude, without has still happened the use.

Definition of the Relapse

The relapse is defined as the setback process to the behavior patterns and typical

thought of the active addiction that had been overcome already, and that finally

they take from turn to the use, going back until arriving from turn to the state of

addictive illness that existed before beginning the recovery.

To be able to speak of relapse a person it should have been previously in recovery,

that is to say abstinent and with behavior changes, for a significant period of time.

For the simple one made of not having used for a while, using again, it is not

necessarily a relapse. It could be about alternating consumption episodes, in a

period of active addiction.

Although a relapse can be dangerous and it is translated finally in suffering and

loss of time and energy, the relapses are sometimes also periods of learning, for a

person that wants to recover. In spite of aware of their problem being and of having

good disposition for the recovery, an addict can relapse, but it manages the

situations of risk well or he neglects his process of changes. After a relapse it is but

probable that the addict this clearer one in that you sew has been making bad. It is

not even this way necessary to relapse to be able to learn or to advance in the

recovery.

Symptoms of a Relapse

A person in recovery can begin to show symptoms of a relapse a lot before the

consumption. To be able to identify these symptoms and to treat those on time can

help to prevent a relapse:

DRUGS PAGE 20

1. I return of the obsessive thought with regard to the use: They could be

relative thoughts to the use, dreams or desires of using that they return

after they had disappeared.

2. Challenge attitude with regard to the recovery plan: To return to the

places of risk, see people related with the use again.

3. Neglect the recovery plan: To stop to go to meetings, or to miss

appointments with the therapist, to stop to read or to exercise.

4. Isolation or contact loss: with the new recovery relationships.

5. Irritability: especially in the addict's significant relationships.

6. Obsession with the image or the physical defects: excessive diets,

excessive concern about the weight.

7. Depression feelings and floating anxiety: emotional uncomfortable

states that are not necessarily related with any external event happen.

8. Reborn or the resentments are exalted toward other people.

9. Frequent discussions in the home and the family.

10. Defensiveness to talk about his recovery or to be fed back.

11. Insomnia, uneasiness and difficulty to rest.

12. Preoccupation obsessive for the money and for the financial security.

These are alone some of the symptoms related to the syndrome of the relapse.

Each person is different and therefore will show typical symptoms, but in general is

markedly notable the presence and evolution of this syndrome. One of the

paradoxes of the relapse is that while but marked they are the symptoms, less

capacity has the addict to be able to accept the constructive critics of people that

surround it, and that they could worry about the possibility of a relapse.

OVERDOSE

What is an overdose?

The overdose is a natural reaction of the body in front of an excess of drugs, or a

combination of them. When that happens, your body loses the capacity to tolerate

the drug: you lose the knowledge, you stop to breathe, for the heart or you have

convulsions. All these things can cause you the death. But the overdose doesn't

have why to be mortal!

Any person that uses drugs can suffer an overdose: both those who use them for

the first time who have used them for long.

There are many factors that can cause an overdose, and many of them don't have

to do with the drugs. The problems of health, the depression or the lack of self-

esteem, lack of appropriate housing, the illegality or the shortage of drugs and the

lack of syringes don't have an immediate solution. It is important to recognize the

DRUGS PAGE 21

existence of these problems and to think how and why you use them. This can lead

to a less dangerous use of the drugs. This pamphlet is about simple measures to

reduce the risk of an overdose. Also explains what one can make to save the life

of somebody that has taken an excessive dose of drug.

As it happen the overdose

The cause more common of death for overdose is the mixture of drugs (as heroine,

pills and alcohol). The drugs that take their effects jointly can increase. The

sedative or depressive (drugs that calm down), increase the risk of to lose the

knowledge and to stop to breathe. The stimulants (drugs that hurry and they

excite), the risk of convulsions or attacks increase to the heart.

• Avoid mixing the drugs that have the same effects, as the heroine with other

depressive (for example, alcohol, Xanax or clonopina) ones or cocaine with other

stimulants (for example, amphetamines and ecstasy).

If you plan to drink alcohol and also to use heroine, it uses smaller quantities, it

uses the heroine and wait first before drinking. If you use heroine first and then you

drink throughout several hours, your body has the opportunity to eliminate part of

the heroine before begin the effects of the alcohol. Also, you will have the clear

mind to measure heroine's dose. (The same thing happens with the sedative or

depressive).

Tolerance has much to do with the overdose. When using a drug for the first time,

your body is not used to it. If you stop using drugs for a while, were you in jail or in

a detoxification program your tolerance low and your body can not tolerate the

same amount as tolerated?

Although no drug use or just for a few days, your body can react to them as

the first time that did you use. By measuring your dose takes into

consideration if your health has deteriorated or has lost weight. Decrease

the dose.

It uses the drug so that makes you more slowly effect, for example, aspiring

heroine or cocaine instead of injecting you.

It uses your drugs in a person's company that knows what to make in case

you lose the knowledge. If you are alone, warn to a friendship so that it is

pending of you.

Learn as much about the drugs you plan to use, you may now be stronger

than the last time I used them.

DRUGS PAGE 22

Care if you will use a new drug, because it is difficult to determine the

appropriate dose. Use it in a person's company that has had experience

with that drug.

Consuming too much drug in a short time can cause you an overdose, since the

drugs accumulate in the body.

Hopes the drug makes you effect before using more. You could saturate to

your organism if doesn't give enough time.

Buy only what you will use. If you buy but of what you will use, it is about

hiding the excess in some side, for example, with a friend that is not user.

It is about controlling the quantity that you use. While but you use, the

quantity of drugs increases in your body.

You control the preparation and the administration, you are the only one that

you know how much you can tolerate.

The control of the quality doesn't exist for the illicit drugs. Especially if you buy of a

different salesperson every day, you never know what you are buying. The purity of

the drugs that are sold in the street varies day by day. Often, they mix them with

other cheaper drugs that can be dangerous.

Examine or buy all the drugs.

If you have doubts on what you have just bought, and in general you inject

yourself, first aspire a little. Or otherwise:

Inject you a small quantity to see how powerful it is the drug that you

bought.

If you got something particularly strong, tell your friends. If you obtain your

needles in a program of exchange of syringes, ask them to notice people

putting an announcement about the danger that is causing that drug.

It is about buying to a salesperson regularly in which you can trust. Speaks

with other buyers and asks them about the quality of the product.

The changes of health can place you in overdose risk. To be sick or to get off

weight affects your tolerance and the capacity of your body to be adjusted to the

drug.

It uses less quantity when you are sick or recovering of an illness.

If you have gotten off weight it uses less to determine how much you

need.

In general the women weigh less than the men. If you are woman and

you will use drugs with a man, make sure that this one took into account

when the dose is measured for you.

DRUGS PAGE 23

Take care, eats and sleeps well, drinks abundant quantities of fruit juices

and it dilutes, and it visits the doctor at least once a year.

Consuming to alone the probability of a mortal overdose increases, because there

is not anybody that is in charge of you when you lose the knowledge. It is about

consuming in people of trust company, and talks with them about a plan in the

event of overdose (see below).

It organizes a support system with people that know that you use drugs.

When you plan to use them to alone, leave it to him to taste like this people

of trust and ask them to be in charge of watching over you.

If you are alone and that will suffer an overdose, calls at the 911 or one of

your friendships, while you can make it.

If you use drugs too alone you don't put the insurance to the door, so that

the paramedics or your friends can enter in the event of being necessary.

Thinking each step well when using drugs can decrease the probabilities of

having an overdose and the errors that cause the same one can diminish.

TYPES OF DRUGS

COCAINE

It is a contained alkaloid in the leaves of the bush "Erythroxylon coca" being

chemically a derived of the latropina. It is a cerebral extremely potent stimulant, of

similar effects to the amphetamines. Also is an energetic vasoconstrictor and local

anesthetic, being absorbed by the mucous ones nasal when it aspires it to him, it is

metabolized in the liver and it is eliminated by the urine. In the decade of 1980, the

experiments on consumption patterns and quantities certified their effects on the

adrenaline, very related with the aggressiveness. The consumption of this

substance is related closely with criminal facts and of violence.

In the two útimas decades there was an enormous increment in the quantity from

addicted people to the cocaine, standing out you like significant fact the

simultaneous addiction to other substances. The consequences of their

consumption are complex, involving damages of very diverse nature: cerebral,

social, family, environmental, etc.

The cocaine stimulates the nervous central system, acting directly on the brain.

Their physiologic immediate effects are: sweating, increase in the muscular power,

mydriasis, increment of heart activity and sanguine pressure, dilation of the

sanguine outlying glasses, convulsions, and increase in the breathing rhythm and

of the corporal temperature. These symptoms can provoke the death for heart

unemployment or breathing flaws. They also show up irritations and ulcers in the

DRUGS PAGE 24

mucous one nasal. Commonly it causes nasal congestion that can show up or not

with secretion it liquidates.

The use for via injectable it exposes the addict to infections of AIDS, hepatitis B

and C, tetanus and other illnesses infectious. The infection with the HIV can take

place for direct transmission of virus when sharing needles and other polluted

devices. Also, it can take place indirectly for prenatal transmission to a boy whose

mother is infected with the HIV. The use and abuse of illicit drugs, including the

crack and the cocaine, has transformed into the main factor of infection risk with

the virus HIV. Added it, the hepatitis C is spreading quickly among the addicts that

are injected; the infection index varies between the 65 and 90 percent in this group

of people, according to the country. Until today, has not been discovered a vaccine

against the virus of the hepatitis C, and the available only treatment is expensive,

many fruitless times and with collateral serious effects.

The cocaine is an extremely addictive drug whose effects are perceived in a lapse

of 10 seconds and they last around 20 minutes. It acts directly on the cerebral

centers in charge of the sensations of the pleasure. Given their high capacity to

produce damages and until cellular destruction, the sensations that were pleasant

in recently initiate fellows transform into unpleasant effects as agitation, cry,

irritability, visual, auditory and tactile type hallucinations, paranoid delirium,

amnesia, confusion, phobias or limitless terror, anxiety, stupor, serious depression

and suicidal tendencies. The psychic effects recognized by most of the authors and

picked up in recent publications they include euphoria, uncertainty, increase of the

verbal communication and of the security in oneself, restlessness, anorexy,

insomnia and hypomania.

The addict experiences loss of interest and impossibility of feeling pleasure before

the lack of the substance. This way, the cocaine transforms into the only objective

and reason in the addict's life, displacing all type of feelings. The relationship with

the criminal phenomena is specifically mentioned by the authors, associating its

consumption to the bias to the crime.

Cocaine is consumed by many different types of subjects and motifs. Consumers

are subject to occasional weak and unstable personalities who develop

psychological dependence quick. The cocaine has conditions that trigger that may

be the strengthening of an insecure personality, which receives support in

stimulating toxic. Instead of treating this pathological deficit or antidepressant drugs

mood stabilizers are used to track fast apparently. The usual addicts are tolerant

and require higher doses to achieve the same results. To this can be reached for

various reasons but always related to family factors, social and environmental

determinants.

DRUGS PAGE 25

Since the effects of cocaine exceeded its peak at thirty minutes, the individual

requires several doses throughout the day to achieve some emotional stability and

avoid dysphonic effect that causes the drug itself after several hours of ingestion.

HEROINE

The heroine is an addictive drug whose use constitutes a serious problem in the

United States. Recent studies suggest that there has been a change in the form in

that the heroine is used, passing of being injected it to inhale it or to smoke it,

because now a heroine of more purity is gotten and that prevails the erroneous

concept that these employment forms are safer.

The heroine is a derived of the morphine, a substance that happens naturally and

is extracted of the acorn of the poppy or Asian poppy. The heroine generally

appears in form of white or brown powder. The street names related with this drug

include "pasta", "H", white" "lady, white" "powder and "lenguazo" in Spanish and

"smack", "H", "skag", and "junk" in English. Other names refer to heroine's type

taken place in a geographical specific area, as "Mexican black tar (black "Mexican

tar")."

Dangers for the health

The heroine's abuse is associated with serious consequences for the health,

including the mortal overdose, the spontaneous abortion, and the occlusion of the

veins and, particularly in the case of the users that inject it to him, infectious

illnesses, including the HIV / AIDS and the hepatitis.

The short term effects of the heroine's abuse appear soon after of the first dose

and they disappear in some few hours. After heroine's injection, the user says to

feel a bud of euphoria (a "rush") accompanied by a warm flushing of the skin, dry

mouth and heaviness in the extremities. After this initial euphoria, the user passes

to a sensation of being flying ("on the nod"), a state in that it is alternated among

being totally awake and the sleepiness. The mental abilities are upset due to the

depression of the nervous central system. The heroine's long term effects appear

after having used the drug repeatedly for some period of time. The chronic users

can suffer occlusion of the veins, infection of the endocardium and of the valves of

the heart, abscesses, cellulitis, and illnesses of the liver. They can have lung

complications that include several pneumonia types as a result of the not well state

of health of the junkie one, as well as for the heroine's effects depressors on the

breathing.

The heroine's abuse during the pregnancy jointly with their related (for example,

the lack of prenatal cares) many environmental factors, has been related to

DRUGS PAGE 26

adverse consequences including a first floor weight when being born, a factor of

important risk for subsequent delays in the development.

Besides the effects of the same drug, the heroine that is sold in the street can have

preservatives that are not dissolved easily and they cause an obstruction in the

sanguine glasses that go to the lungs, to the liver, to the kidneys or the brain. This

can cause infection or until the death of small groups of cells in these vital organs.

The Net of Alert about the Abuse of Drugs (DAWN, for their initials in English) * it

registers the heroine / morphine among the four drugs mentioned with more

frequency in the cases of deaths related to drugs in the one 2002. In the whole

country, the mentions of visits to the emergency rooms related with the heroine

stayed without statistical change among the 2001 at the 2002, but they have

increased 35 percent from 1995.

The tolerance, the addiction and the abstinence

The heroine's regular use produces tolerance to the drug, what means that the

user has to use a bigger quantity of heroine to obtain the same intensity of the

effect. This use of higher dose takes with the time to the physical dependence and

the addiction. With the physical dependence, the body adapts to the presence of

the drug and it can suffer the symptoms of the syndrome of abstinence if the use

decreases or discontinued.

The syndrome of abstinence that in the abusive ones habitual it can happen as

quick as at the few hours of the last administration of the drug, it provokes a

vehement desire to use heroine, agitation, pains in the muscles and in the bones,

insomnia, diarrhea, vomit, chills with hen ("cold turkey" or to "break in cold") skin,

movements in form of kicks ("kicking the habit") and other symptoms. The main

symptoms of this syndrome reach their maximum point between the 48 and 72

hours after the last dose and they calm down after approximately one week.

Although the syndrome of abstinence of the heroine is considered less dangerous

than that of the alcohol or that of the barbiturates, occasionally it can be mortal

when a junkie one with a strong dependence to the drug and in not well state of

health leaves it abruptly.

MARIHUNA

The cannabis sativa is a wild bush that grows in temperate and tropical areas,

being able to arrive a height six meters, being extracted of its resin the hashish.

Their more outstanding component psychoactive is the delta-9-

tetrahidrocannabinol (delta-9-THC), containing the plant more than sixty related

components. Wastes away preferably puff of smoke, although they can be carried

DRUGS PAGE 27

out infusions, with different effects. A cigarette of marijuana can contain 150 mg. of

THC, and to arrive until twice as much if it contains oil of hashish, that which can

take to the syndrome of abstinence according to some authors if wastes away

between 10 and 20 days. The tolerance is credited, being crossed when wastes

away jointly with opiate and alcohol. Regarding the dependence, it is considered

primarily psychic. The characteristic symptoms of the intoxication are: anxiety,

irritability, tremors, insomnias, very similar to those of the benzodiazepines.

It can show up in different consumption modalities, be in leaves that are smoked

directly, in resin of the bush or in removed oil of this last. Of the modality in that

shows up the drug their denomination it will depend: "marijuana" is the name of the

leaves of the crumbled hemp that after drying off and to be treated can be smoked

(it is also known as "grass", "marijuana", marijuana", "speck", "mafú", "grass",

"maría", "mount", "moy", "coffee", "chocolate", "chala", etc.; in English knows it to

him as: "pot", "herb", "grass", "weed", "Mary Jane", "reefer", "skunk", "boom",

"gangster", "kif", "ganja", etc.); their effect is approximately five times minor that

that of the hashish. The name "hashish" derives (also well-known as "hashis") of

the (hashiscins) Arabs that combatted in the crusades among the years 1090 and

1256. The hashish is obtained of the inflorescence of the female hemp, resinous

substance that shows up in form of compact sheets with a characteristic scent. The

marijuana is the most frequent form, containing from 0,3 to 3,5% of THC; the

concentration of THC arrives to 10% in the hashish, being its diverse effect

according to factors like the speed with which one smokes, the duration of the

inhalation, inhaled quantity, time that the consumer retains the breathing after

inhaling and the fellow's psychic state. The oral consumption, so much of

marijuana as of hashish, it implies psychological similar effects to those expressed

in the smoked form but of bigger intensity and duration and with noxious developed

effects.

Therapeutically sought advice for insomnia treatments and as sedative for the pain.

It was also prescribed for therapies of nervous pathologies, as well as for the

treatment of the cough, tremors in compulsive paralysis, bladder spasms and

sexual impotence that it doesn't come from organic illness. Likewise it was

recommended as aphrodisiac, antineuralgic, tranquilizer for maniac-depressive,

antihysteric, tonic cerebral, I remedy for the nervous vomit, epilepsy and nervous

illnesses. These recommendations were dissuaded later on unanimously by the

medicine, being at the present time only in study the legalization of a derived

pharmacy of this substance to mitigate the pains in sick cancerous. This

therapeutic employment has created deep polemic. At the present time, the

scientists sustain that the marijuana cannot be considered medication in none in

the ways in that it is consumed by the addicts. When treating their possible use as

DRUGS PAGE 28

medication, is distinguished between the marijuana and pure THC and other

specific derived chemists of the cannabis. The pure marijuana contains hundred of

chemical, extremely harmful some of them to the health. THC in pill form for oral (it

is not smoked) consumption could be used in the treatment of the side effects (you

nauseate and vomit) effects in some treatments against the cancer. Another

chemist related with THC (nabilone) has been authorized by "Food and Drug

Administration" of United States for the treatment of the cancer sick persons that

suffer nauseas. In their oral form, THC is also used in sick of AIDS, because it

helps them to eat well and to maintain its weight. The scientists study the

possibility that THC and other chemists related with the marijuana have certain

medicinal values. Some think that these chemists could be used in the treatment of

the severe pain, but it is necessary to have more evidence before using them for

the treatment of medical problems.

The available modalities of marijuana to the youths are more potent than those that

existed in the decade of the'60. He owes it to that the secret laboratories of the

traffickers have been able to carry out changes at genetic level in the cannabis

sophisticated mediating biotechnology methods, being in a bigger concentration of

THC. The power of the drug is measured according to the quantity average of THC

that is in the samples of marijuana that confiscate the police agencies. The

common marijuana contains an average of 3, 5% of THC. The hashish (gummy

resin of the flowers of the female plants) can have until 28% of THC. The oil of

hashish, a resinous liquid and I thicken that is distilled of the hashish, has an

average of 16% of THC, but can end up having up to 43%.

HASHISH

It is elaborated pressing the resin of the plant female cannabis. As this vegetable in

fact concentrates their active ingredients on the resin, the content of THC of a dose

of hashish is superior to the one of one of marijuana without to process that is

located in little more than 10%.

The cannabis oil or of hashish it is obtained mixing the resin of the plant with some

solvent as nail polish remover, alcohol or gasoline. Of this, a certain one leaves

evaporates, giving place to a viscous mixture whose proportions of THC are very

high (until 50%).

The techniques applied to improve the cultivations of marijuana make that today

contained THC in these plants is much more powerful that in previous decades. To

this sinks that, at the present time, most of the marijuana that the traffickers sell

comes pressed with chemical solvent preservatives as kerosene or benzene, what

produces more severe damages.

DRUGS PAGE 29

Other denominations: Hash, chocolate.

Aspect

The hashish has the aspect of a bar of pressed mud, of brown very dark color, as

the chocolate. Occasionally, shows up in pills.

Administration road

As much the Marijuana as the Hashish are inhaled and they ingest. The marijuana

is generally smoked, in cigarettes made by hand or in specially designed

(sometimes with canes long or small deposits of water to cool the fume that usually

reaches high temperatures) pipes. Also eats up (in cakes or cookies). The hashish

is smoked blended with tobacco.

Effects / Risks

The effects are of quick appearance and they vary according to the dose, the

cannabis type and the individual's psychic and physical state that it consummates

it.

Immediate effects:

Initially, low dose can produce pleasant sensations of calm and well-being,

increase of the appetite, euphoria, desinhibición, concentration loss, decreased

reflexes, like talking and laughing, red eyes,, acceleration of the heart rhythm,

dryness in the mouth and throat, difficulty to execute mental complex (to surrender

an exam, for example) processes, alterations of the temporary and sensorial

perception, and it can diminish the short term memory. To it continues to a second

depression phase and drowsiness.

In high dose, it can provoke confusion, lethargy, excitement, anxiety, altered

perception of the reality and, of more unusual way, wonderful states and

hallucinations.

Long term:

It highlights the very discussed "syndrome amotivational ", (decrease of the

personal initiative) together to a frequent drop of the concentration capacity and

memorization.

The chemical structure of the cannabis is very complex and the sequels taken

place by all their components are not still known. Yes one can affirm that the fume

of this plant contains carcinogens more agents than the tobacco, and as the

smokers of marijuana or hashish they inhale the fume deeply without filtering and

DRUGS PAGE 30

they retain it in the lungs so much time as they can, the cannabis is still more

noxious for the breathing system than the tobacco. Their use has also associated

to the appearance of illnesses like sinusitis and bronchitis.

We can also, to cause alterations in the reproductive masculine and feminine

(infertility, for example) and immunologic systems, and as THC it crosses the

barrier and mammary, their consumption supposes a risk for the fetus as much

during the pregnancy and lactation.

It can generate tolerance and dependence, with the consequent syndrome of

abstinence (link to page where it is explained) in case it is suspended the use of

the drug abruptly. This becomes in anxiety, insomnia, irritability, depression and

anorexia, among other symptoms.

It is proven the potential of cannabis as a trigger of psychosis and delusions and

hallucinations boxes in people at risk.

Not all cannabis user will necessarily experience with other more dangerous

substances, but the risk exists.

Also, it is the danger of to condition or to limit the possibilities to live free and

autonomously the personal development in the adolescents.

Also believe a psychological dependence: the user feels like the drug for his

effects.

ECSTASY

The metilendioximetanfetamina (MDMA) (also well-known as "ecstasy", "ectasi",

"XTC", "chalk", "glass", "X", etc.) is a drug synthetic psychoactive with

hallucinogenic properties of moving great potential and psychological agitator, with

similar effects to the amphetamines. It is a dangerous drug in end for their

properties neurotoxic and high addiction, affecting to diverse areas of the nervous

central system. Their production is carried out in secret laboratories starting from

matters cousins relatively easy of getting. Of white color, without scent but with

bitter flavor, shows up in form of tablets, capsules or powdered crystalline that is

dissolved in liquids, being able to be drunk, ingested or injected. Their consumers

are mainly young adults that look for in her a stimulant that takes them to dance

during extensive periods of time (hence it usually denominates them to him "disk-

drugs", "club-drugs", "dance-drugs", etc.). During the years sixty were used with

therapeutic ends since according to certain sectors of the psychiatry helped to the

communication and the treatment of phobic neurosis Then came the controversial

medical - legal, attributing to their consumption impacts on crime,, for that finally

was illegalized.

DRUGS PAGE 31

The ecstasy produces potential great agitator's whose duration fluctuates between

the 3 and the 6 hours from its consumption psychic effects. Initially the fellow

experiences sensations of trust and excitement, to those that it follows a

hyperactivity state. The effects of the stimulant are diluted provoking psychological

dysfunctions, confusion, problems with the dream (nightmares, insomnia), loss by

heart, I want uncontrollable of consuming drugs, depression, violence, serious

anxiety, psychosis and paranoia again. These effects even show up after several

weeks of the consumption. Serious cases of psychosis were also informed. Among

the physical symptoms they make an appointment: hiperpnea, tachycardia,

anorexia, tension and muscular similar dysfunctions to the present in the illness of

Parkinson, bruxism, nauseas, blurred vision, nystagmus, fainting, chills and

excessive sweating, characteristic sign during the intoxication. It has been proven

that the increase of the heart frequency and the arterial tension is causal of heart

attacks and other dysfunctions cardiovascular. Forensic reports indicate that it is

causal of sudden death. The Hyperactivity carries, besides the heart problems,

hyperthermia, dehydration and renal flaws.

The investigations demonstrate that MDMA destroys the neurons serotonin

producers that regulate the aggression directly, the state of spirit, the sexual

activity, the dream and the sensibility to the pain. It is probable that this action on

the system producing of serotonin is the origin of the psychic properties. MDMA

also keeps relationship in its structure and its effects with the methamphetamine,

which has proven to cause degeneration of neurons containing the

neurotransmitter substance dopamine.

In laboratory experiments, a single exhibition to the methamphetamine in high dose

or the use prolonged in low dose destroys until 50% of the cerebral cells. Although

this damage is not immediately apparent, the scientific studies show that with the

aging or the exhibition to other toxics symptoms of the illness of Parkinson can

appear. These begin with coordination lack and tremors and to the long one they

can cause a paralysis form.

CRAK

The crack is the popular name of the product that is obtained transforming the

hydrochloride of cocaine into glasses or "rocks" by means of a chemical simple

process.

Instead of using the most volatile method in treatment of cocaine with ether, the

crack is manipulated with ammonia or bicarbonate of sodium and it dilutes, it mixes

that it is exposed to the fire to retire the hydrochloride the substance that is - similar

DRUGS PAGE 32

to the cocaine - it can be smoked. With this procedure a similar substance takes

place to the cocaine that can be smoked.

The term crack refers to the crack that one hears when the mixture warms,

phenomenon in which mainly the bicarbonate of sodium would intervene.

Other denominations: Rock, glass, baseball, Mrs. White, white snows, champagne,

sugar.

It points out historical

The crack is considered a highly addictive drug. Their appearance is a recent

phenomenon. In 1985, daily The New York Time mentioned "a new form of drug

called crack" for the first time. One year later, this same publication affirmed that

the crack was the biggest news after Vietnam and the North American former

president's fall Richard Nixon. Other media ended up comparing the dispersion of

this drug with the plagues that decimated the European population in the middle

Ages.

During good part of the decade of the 80, the drug dealers of San Francisco's bay,

United States, sold tons from this drug to the gangs of the streets of The Angel. By

means of the crack traffic, the street bands were able to obtain the money and the

necessary connections to buy automatic weapons and to be made of the

necessary infrastructure to sustain their illicit business. With this phenomenon it

was that the first connection opened up for the most part between the posters of

the Colombian drug and the neighborhoods black of Los Angeles, city well-known

today like the world capital of the crack.

Aspect

The crack shows up in form of crystalline rocks of white or yellowish color.

Administration road

The crack is smoked and its consumers usually make it in glass pipes.

Effects and Risks

Immediate effects

Euphoria.

Stimulation of the nervous central system.

Anxiety.

Fear.

Depression.

Apathy.

DRUGS PAGE 33

It anguishes.

In pregnant women, it can provoke deterioration of the fetus, to slow their

growth in the uterus and premature childbirth, among other complications.

Mouth dryness

Sensation of ardor in the eyes

Sweating

Throbs

Headache

Muscular contractions

I increase in the reflections.

Dilation of the pupils

Long term effects

Irritability

Insomnia

Loss of weight

Hypertension

Heart arrhythmia

Tremors

Sexual indifference

Chronic accesses of cough.

Paranoia

Visual miniaturized perceptions.

Lung infections

In pregnant women it can provoke fetal deterioration, I slow in the uterine

growth, and I leave premature and other complications.

AMPHETAMINES

The consumption of this exciting one is broadly extended and distributed by all the

social classes. Contrary to what happens to the cocaine that consume it preferably

the sectors means and high, the amphetamines are consumed so much by

executives that seek overexcitement like for housewives that look for an anorexic

for their diets or for students that prepare exams. When impacting in the system

orthosympathetic they cause hypertension, tachycardia, hyperglycemia, mydriasis,

peripheral vasodilation, hyperpnoea, hyperoxia, etc. The state of the addict's spirit

oscillates between the dystrophy and the hypomania, showing up anxiety,

insomnia, migraine, tremors and vertigo. May appear paranoid depressive

syndromes and amphetamine.

DRUGS PAGE 34

A normal dose, its effects vary by individual and intake conditions. They can

produce pleasant effects, , hyperactivity and overflowing sensation of energy, but

they also cause tremor, anxiety irritability, unmotivated and sudden anger,

dysfunctions amnesiacs and incoherence. In the last phase depression, paranoid

squares and paranoid deliriums, hallucinations and behavior dysfunctions are

described. The consumption of amphetamines can lead to aggressive

performances, the same as the barbiturates and the alcohol, for its great euphoric

effect, coupled with a lack of control in the inhibitory instincts.

Such situations take place when the given doses, usually intravenously over 2 gr.

A bigger potential is demonstrated in the amphetamines that in the cocaine, so

much in its more algid point as in the duration of the effects. React very serious

they take place when consuming them with barbiturates in the well-known

phenomenon of the pluritoxicomanía. Taken in important dose they are causing of

confusion, tension, sharp anxiety and fear. Can also precipitate paranoid

psychosis in no psychotic subject. The psychosis Amphetamine developed by the

fellow resembles each other to the paranoiac psychosis and the paranoiac

schizophrenia.

INHALING

Inside this group of substances they can make an appointment:

1) Adhesives: lines, toluene, xileno, nail polish remover, benzols, benzaldehido

2) aerosol-sprays-gases: propellant gases, nitrous oxide

3) Plastic cements: hexane

4) You pay of paintings and related: petroleum, butane, turpentine, paint

thinner

5) Liquids for cleaning: xileno, benzol, ether of petroleum

6) Anesthetics: ethylic pure ether

7) Fuels: gasoline, naphthas

8) Thinner: halogenated hydrocarbons

9) Vasodilators: amyl nitrite, butyl nitrite, and many others

The consumption of these substances presents sanitary serious problems. Their

consumers are mainly marginal, especially children, although the addiction is also

given with relative frequency in certain professional groups. The most frequent

ages in the chronic use of inhaling are at the beginning or at the end of the

adolescence. This owes you partly to the invitation or pressure on the part of the

school partners and friends, curiosity and ignorance of the toxic effects and

personal insecurity. The most important thing is the ignorance of the problem in the

house and the negation of the parents that their children can have this problem.

DRUGS PAGE 35

The reasons of the consumption are due to the curiosity, boredom, and lack of

stimuli, eradication and lack of ownership. In the case of the professionals, the

habitual contact with the substances can create an involuntary addiction; the

voluntary addiction is less frequent, although not exceptional. These products are

generally easy to obtain and they are within reach of the addict, they are very

cheap, and they don't specify of instruments for their use. Also, it is not necessary

to contact a criminal to obtain them. Their use can be made in any place, they are

easy to hide and difficult to detect. Another very important factor is the ignorance of

the consequences and dangers of its use.

These substances waste away in rural certain areas, I eat likewise in marginal

atmospheres or of low resources, where they are from the few drugs to those that

has easy access. It increases it the problem of a legal substance that is used in an

incorrect way. The addiction to these substances is the previous step to other

drugs, taking irreversible situations. This is usually ignored as much for the family

as for the social environment, as these substances go unnoticed and are not

related to addictions. There are three big groups of consumers: 1) children and

excluded populations' adolescents that they consume in group; 2) adults that

consent to the chemist for their profession or for association with people's groups

with similar habits; 3) marginal adults that inhale the substances the same as the

children, but in solitary. The family aspect is decisive to understand the

phenomenon, there being you verified how the inhalers also present problems with

the alcohol, being of a class half social drop and low, and with problems of family

abandonment.

TOBACCO

The addiction to the derived products of the tobacco is the most extended. Their

cultural acceptance considers in the first place to its consumption like a source of

pleasure and in second as a simple bad habit or bad habit. It has been determined

that the cigarettes and other products of tobacco, such as pure cigarettes, tobacco

for pipe or snuff (powdered), they are addictive and that the nicotine is the drug of

the causing tobacco of addiction. Also, it is known that the smoking is an important

one causal of heart accidents and cerebrovascula, and it occupies the first places

among the factors that provoke cancer. The nicotine provokes one of the most

potent addictions, developing in the smoker a group of signs and symptoms

denominated syndrome nicotinic. To bigger quantity of signs or symptoms present,

bigger percentage of possibilities of being in front of an addicted nicotinómano.

Nicotinic Syndrome: signs and addiction symptoms to the nicotine

High consumption newspaper of cigarettes (15 or more per day)

DRUGS PAGE 36

To smoke cigarettes with high proportion of nicotine, dissatisfaction or

increase from the consumption when changing to "soft" or "ligths"

Deep inhalation of the fume.

To smoke from the first hours of the day, or until the previous moment to the

dream

To suffer compulsion smoking: not to support some few hours without

smoking; to interrupt other tasks or entertainments to smoke or to buy

cigarettes.

The nicotine is an extremely addictive alkaloid that acts as stimulant and sedative

of the nervous central system. Their ingestion has an almost immediate stimulus

as a result because it produces a discharge of epinephrine of the suprarenal bark.

This stimulates the nervous central system and some endocrine glands, what

causes the sudden liberation of glucose. The stimulus goes followed by depression

and it tires, situation that takes to the junkie one to look for more nicotine. The

nicotine is absorbed with easiness of the fume of the tobacco in the lungs and it

doesn't care if this fume comes from cigarettes or of pure. It is also absorbed easily

when one chews the tobacco. With the regular use, they accumulate

concentrations of nicotine in the body during the day that persist during the night.

Therefore, people that smoke cigarettes to newspaper are exposed to the effects

of the nicotine 24 hours a day. The nicotine absorbed when smoking cigarettes or

cigars only takes seconds in arriving to the brain, but a direct effect in the body

until for 30 minutes.

The studies have shown that the nervous tension and the anxiety affect the

tolerance to the nicotine and her dependence. The hormone taken place by the

nervous tension or corticosterone reduces the effects of the nicotine, making

necessary to consume bigger quantities to achieve the same effect. This increases

the tolerance and it takes to a bigger dependence. It has been demonstrated

scientifically that the tension can be the direct cause from a relapse to the self-

administration of nicotine after a period of abstinence. This addiction produces

symptoms of abstinence when a person is about stopping to smoke. Some reports

indicate that when it is deprived of cigarettes during 24 hours to habitual smokers,

it increases their anger and hostility, arriving to physical or psychic aggressions,

and it diminishes the aptitude of social cooperation. People that suffer of

abstinence also need more time to recover their emotional balance after the

nervous tension. During the periods of abstinence or of longings of consuming

nicotine, the smokers have shown reduction of a great quantity of functions

psychomotor and cognitive, I eat the understanding of the language for example.

The behavior studies in adolescents explain how the social influences, for example

to observe adults and partners smoking, they influence in the adolescent's decision

DRUGS PAGE 37

of beginning to smoke cigarettes or not. It has also shown that the adolescents are

usually resistant to many types of messages against the tobacco.

Additionally, the problems affect at third that inhale the environmental fume of the

tobacco (passive smokers). It has been demonstrated that this fume causes lung

cancer and they increase the cases of asthmatic attacks, infections

cardiorespiratory and sudden death significantly.

ALCOHOL

The causes of the alcoholism are very varied, there not being agreement scientist

on this aspect. The cultural and biological-genetic factors explain great part of the

pathology. This addiction affects to all the social classes, for what is not acceptable

a theory that assists to the character sociocultural first floor as factor predisposing

to the addiction, since in the high classes the consumption is extensive. Regarding

the level of education is clear that lack of education and culture conditions the

addiction, but of all the drugs. It cannot attribute him and unique explanation of the

Addiction, since they influence social problems so varied as the crime, the family

problems, the unemployment or the health. The addiction to the alcohol possesses

cultural important aspects from the moment in that the consumption is licit and the

minors, in spite of the prohibitions, don't have problem to consume it. The publicity

and the permissibility increase the number of consumers.

The alcoholic's profile etiology was made in diverse ways, assisting to biological,

sociocultural, economic, environmental and psychological theories. The dynamic

theories and psychopathological understand that the alcoholics arrive to the

addiction conditioned by a previous pathology that unchain the phenomenon

together to environmental situations. The family environment can be decisive:

before the family distorted situation the fellow erects psychological defenses

against the anxiety. On the other hand, the minors spread to follow the example of

their adults. Other reasons of the alcoholism are the escape desires and of self-

destruction, dice the great number of suicides that presents this illness.

Important progress has been achieved in the understanding from the genetic bias

to the alcoholism. Studies made on twins and siblings twins indicate that there is

more than a gene responsible for this bias. The investigations have not deciphered

the form in that the genes act exactly; it is still ignored if the genes are specifically

decisive of the alcoholism, or if more generally interact on temperament increasing

vulnerability. The success in the discovery of the genes involved in the bias to the

alcoholism would help to recognize the vulnerable individuals, and would also help

to prevent and to develop treatments against the alcoholism.

DRUGS PAGE 38

The effects of the alcohol are immediate because it is absorbed almost instantly,

passing directly to the sanguine torrent. When arriving to the brain, it narcotizes the

neurons hindering first and impeding the communication then among them. This

takes place in first term in the regions of the brain in charge of the reasoning and

other complex processes. As the alcoholization progresses the primitive regions

they are affected.

FLORIPONDIO

Her name is Brugmansiavulcanicola and it is native of America of the South. One

of their active principles is the hallucinogenic scopolamine

Administration road: Oral.

The leaves and milled flowers get ready in hot water or fry and takes as tea.

Effects

They include periods of violence and even temporary insanity. The hallucinations

can be visual, auditory and tactile.

It also provokes dilation of the pupils, increase of the pulse and the breathing, dry

rhythm the mucous of the nose, mouth and throat.

The effects begin between the 15 and later 30 minutes to their consumption they

can last up to 72 hours. The lethal dose of scopolamine is near to the 100 mg;

however, the exact dosage is not known that can contain a floripondio tea.

Generally, a moderate dose is prepared with a flower, a high dose would be two to

three flowers, but in this type of drug substances and there is no safe dose.

DRUGS PAGE 39

DRUGS PAGE 40

Drugs

STIMULANT DRUGS ARE :

DRUGS PAGE 41

DEPRESIVE SUBSTANCES

NARCOTICS

DRUGS PAGE 42

HALLUCINOGENS

ADDICTIVE SUBSTANCES

LEGAL DRUGS ARE BETWEEN

DRUGS PAGE 43

ILLEGAL DRUGS ARE

CAUSES OF ADDICTION

DRUGS PAGE 44

PROBLEMS AROUND

TYPES OF DRUGS

COCAINE

DRUGS PAGE 45

HEROINE

MARIHUANA

HASHISH

DRUGS PAGE 46

Ecstasy

Crack

AMPHETAMINES

DRUGS PAGE 47

INHALING

CIGARETTE

ALCOHOL

FLORIPONDIO