Drug Facts in Media

A study shows that more than a third of individuals who consider themselves in recovery from an alcohol or other substance use disorder continue to suffer from chronic physical disease.

A study that examined older Americans' well-being before and after medical marijuana laws were passed in their state found reductions in reported pain and increased hours worked. The study suggests medical marijuana laws could be improving older Americans' health.

Researchers have identified which neurons are responsible for cocaine-seeking behaviors in rodents and where these neurons exert their effects within the brain. Their work opens a new line of addiction research that could lead to novel therapeutic approaches for preventing relapse.

Only one group of teenagers used marijuana more often after retail sales were legalized in Washington than they did before -- high school seniors who work 11 or more hours per week, according to new research led by a WSU College of Nursing professor.

An analysis of a previous study has found more evidence to support giving the steroid betamethasone to pregnant women at risk of late-preterm delivery (between 34 and 36 weeks of gestation), according to new research. Hospital stays for infants whose mothers received the drug cost less on average, compared to stays for infants whose mothers did not take the drug.

Even though fewer heart attacks are occurring in the US -- in large part due to the use of medications like statins and a decline in smoking -- these events are steadily rising in very young adults. New data not only validate this trend but also reveal that more heart attacks are striking those under age 40.

Menstrual cycle may influence addiction risk in women, according to a new study.

Medical marijuana may bring relief to older people who have symptoms like pain, sleep disorders or anxiety due to chronic conditions including amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, Parkinson's disease, neuropathy, spinal cord damage and multiple sclerosis, according to a new preliminary study.

New research found a link between state recreational marijuana legalization and increased consumption of certain high-calorie foods.

Researchers focused on glucocorticoid receptors (GRs), the receptors for the body's endogenous steroids, are clarifying part of the mechanism behind metabolic disturbances caused by steroids.

Synthetic biologists have created an enzymatic network in yeast that turns sugar into cannabinoids, including tetrahydrocannabinol and cannabidiol, but also novel cannabinoids not found in the marijuana plant itself. The yeast factories would be more environmentally friendly and less energy intensive than growing the plant and separating out the psychoactive and non-psychoactive ingredients. They may also yield cannabinoid derivatives with unexpected medical uses.

Besides triggering the brain's emotional and stimulus-response systems, environmental cues activate areas where memories are processed, according to this study. Prompting these memory processing systems makes it extra difficult to counter addiction because the classic stimulus-response mechanisms are reinforced by the memory effects of environmental drug cues. While this double effect makes it hard to treat drug abuse, this finding may offer a way to use cues to improve cognitive behavioural therapy.

Researchers recently solved a major gap in scientific literature by using mobile software technology to measure the real-time effects of actual cannabis-based products used by millions of people every day.

A survey of marijuana and tobacco co-users investigators found that co-users with high degree of interrelatedness between their use of the two substances had greater tobacco dependence and smoked more cigarettes per day. However, the finding of a strong link between the two substances was not universal. These finding suggest that highly personalized treatments are needed for co-users who want to quit smoking.

A new study found that the United States has the highest drug overdose death rates among a set of high-income countries. The study found that drug overdose death rates in the United States are 3.5 times higher on average when compared to 17 other high-income counties. The study is the first to demonstrate that the drug overdose epidemic is contributing to the widening gap in life expectancy between the United States and other high-income countries.

A new study has found no evidence that teenage cannabis use is lower in countries with tougher policies.

Seven in 10 parents think they should have a say in whether dispensaries are located near their child's school or daycare and most say they should be banned within a certain distance of those facilities.

According to a large-scale study of American high school students, legalizing medicinal marijuana has actually led to a drop in cannabis use among teenagers. The study used the results of an anonymous survey given to more than 800,000 high school students across 45 states to calculate the number of teens who smoke cannabis.

Sales of prescription psychiatric drugs such as Xanax and diazepam via darknet online drug markets have increased in the UK at an alarming rate, according to new research.

Cannabis is the most commonly used recreational drug by teenagers worldwide. In Canada, among youth aged 15 to 19 years, the rate of past-year cannabis use is 20.6 percent, while in England, 4 percent of adolescents aged 11 to 15 years used cannabis in the last month.