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InvisibleveggieM

Registered: 07/25/04
Posts: 17,504
Experts see rise in U.S. newborns hooked on drugs
    #14268971 - 04/10/11 08:24 PM (12 years, 9 months ago)

Experts see rise in U.S. newborns hooked on drugs
April 10, 2011 - ohio.com

BANGOR, MAINE: The mother got the call in the middle of the night: Her 3-day-old baby was going through opiate withdrawal in the hospital and had to start taking methadone, a drug best known for treating heroin addiction, to ease his suffering.

The mother had abused prescription painkillers like OxyContin for the first 12 weeks of her pregnancy, buying them on the street in rural northern Maine, and then tried to quit cold turkey — a dangerous course, doctors say, that could have ended in miscarriage. The baby had seizures in utero as a result, and his mother, Tonya, turned to methadone treatment, with daily doses to keep her cravings and withdrawal symptoms at bay.

As prescription drug abuse ravages communities across the country, doctors are confronting an emerging challenge: newborns dependent on painkillers. While methadone may have saved Tonya's pregnancy, her son, Matthew, needed to be painstakingly weaned from it.

Infants like him may cry excessively and have stiff limbs, tremors, diarrhea and other problems that make their first days of life excruciating. Many must stay in the hospital for weeks while they are weaned off the drugs, taxing neonatal units and driving the cost of their medical care into the tens of thousands of dollars.

Like the cocaine-exposed babies of the 1980s, those born dependent on prescription opiates — narcotics that contain opium or its derivatives — are entering a world in which little is known about the long-term effects on their development. Few doctors are even willing to treat pregnant opiate addicts, and there is no universally accepted standard of care for their babies, partly because of the difficulty of conducting research on pregnant women and newborns.

Those who do treat pregnant addicts face a jarring ethical quandary: They must weigh whether the harm inflicted by exposing a fetus to powerful drugs, albeit under medical supervision, is justifiable.

''I've had pharmacies that have just called back and said: 'This lady's pregnant. Why do you want me to fill this scrip? I can't do that,' '' said Dr. Craig Smith, a family practitioner in Bridgton, Maine. ''But when you stop and think about what actually happens during withdrawal and how violent it can be, that would certainly be not in the baby's best interest.''

Still, even doctors who advocate treating pregnant addicts have had moments of doubt.

''At first I was going, 'Gosh, what am I doing?' '' said Dr. Thomas Meek, a primary-care physician in Auburn. '' 'Am I really helping these people?' ''

There are no national figures that document the extent of the problem, but interviews with doctors, researchers, social workers and women who abused painkillers while pregnant suggest that it has grown rapidly, especially in rural regions, where officials say such abuse is most common.

In Maine, which has been especially plagued by prescription drug abuse, the number of newborns treated or watched for opiate withdrawal, known as neonatal abstinence syndrome, at the state's two largest hospitals climbed to 276 in 2010 from about 70 in 2005.

Hospitals in states such as Florida and Ohio reported similar increases, and experts said the numbers were probably higher because pregnant women are rarely tested for drug use and many mothers do not admit to abusing opiates.

Tonya, 24, said she was introduced to painkillers like OxyContin, Percocet and Vicodin while working the overnight shift at an industrial bakery. Everyone — including co-workers, the boyfriend she met on the job and their manager — was taking pills, she said.

''It was a lot easier to get through life and have energy,'' Tonya said in January, holding Matthew a month after his birth. He was still being weaned off methadone.


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OfflineKonyap


Registered: 06/30/07
Posts: 33,945
Loc: Planet Piss
Last seen: 4 years, 2 months
Re: Experts see rise in U.S. newborns hooked on drugs [Re: veggie]
    #14269607 - 04/10/11 09:59 PM (12 years, 9 months ago)

i dont wanna say people are pussies now a days but this could have all been avoided with WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED WEED


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OfflineRemix
grammer natze
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Registered: 08/05/10
Posts: 4,171
Last seen: 1 year, 5 months
Re: Experts see rise in U.S. newborns hooked on drugs [Re: veggie] * 1
    #14269988 - 04/10/11 11:21 PM (12 years, 9 months ago)

It's okay. I say we send the babies to prison for being hooked on illegal drugs. They don't speak the language. They don't work. All they do is take, take, take. If they don't like it they can just git out.


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OfflineDiacetylmentlegen
Gentleman
Male


Registered: 06/13/10
Posts: 267
Loc: Ireland Flag
Last seen: 11 years, 6 months
Re: Experts see rise in U.S. newborns hooked on drugs [Re: Remix]
    #14270719 - 04/11/11 05:08 AM (12 years, 9 months ago)

I'm with Remix. He knows the score.


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"When I recall it and when I recall various other symptoms... I think the simplest explanation is... that I had these experiences, that they were real... and that they took place outside time." - Christopher Mayhew


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OfflineShroomDoom
Friend of the Medicine
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Registered: 06/07/04
Posts: 4,435
Loc: A Psychedelic State Flag
Last seen: 1 year, 8 months
Re: Experts see rise in U.S. newborns hooked on drugs [Re: Diacetylmentlegen]
    #14271018 - 04/11/11 07:58 AM (12 years, 9 months ago)

There needs to be more non-addictive painkillers on the market for people who need long term pain management and don't want to be an addict. The cone snail peptide analogs that shut off pain without messing with the opioid receptors are going to be more widespread in the coming years. Hopefully doctors will start prescribing these instead of oxycontin. Drug companies will still make their billions of dollars, nobody has to be a junkie to treat their pain and risk endangering their unborn child's life. Its a win-win.


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Edited by ShroomDoom (04/11/11 08:05 AM)


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