Background: Parental substance use is a substantial public health and safeguarding concern. Research examining the impact of parental substance use upon children is well-established, but there is a lack of research examining how parents/caregivers cope with their parenting role within the context of another parent's substance use, or how best to support these parents/caregivers.
Objective: This paper examines the experiences and support needs of parents/caregivers impacted by another parent's substance use.
Background: Daily methadone maintenance or buprenorphine treatment is the standard-of-care (SoC) medication for opioid use disorder (OUD). Subcutaneously injected, extended-release buprenorphine (BUP-XR) may be more effective-but there has been no superiority evaluation.
Methods: This pragmatic, parallel-group, open-label, multi-centre, effectiveness superiority randomised, controlled, phase 3 trial was conducted at five National Health Service community-based treatment clinics in England and Scotland.
Background And Aims: Heavy alcohol use and depression commonly co-occur. However, health and social care services rarely provide coordinated support for these conditions. Using relational autonomy, which recognizes how social and economic contexts and relational support alter people's capacity for agency, this study aimed to (1) explore how people experience formal care provision for co-occurring alcohol use and depression, (2) consider how this context could lead to adverse outcomes for individuals and (3) understand the implications of these experiences for future policy and practice.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn 2021, during a drug-related death crisis in the UK, the Government published its ten-year drugs strategy. This article, written in collaboration with the Faculty of Public Health and the Association of Directors of Public Health, assesses whether this Strategy is evidence-based and consistent with international calls to promote public health approaches to drugs, which put 'people, health and human rights at the centre'. Elements of the Strategy are welcome, including the promise of significant funding for drug treatment services, the effects of which will depend on how it is utilized by services and local commissioners and whether it is sustained.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: Opioid use disorder (OUD) is a debilitating and persistent disorder. The standard-of-care treatment is daily maintenance dosing of sublingual buprenorphine (BUP-SL) or oral methadone (MET). Monthly, extended-release, subcutaneous injectable buprenorphine (BUP-XR) has been developed to enhance treatment effectiveness.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Sublingual tablet buprenorphine (BUP-SL) and oral liquid methadone (MET) are the daily, standard-of-care (SOC) opioid agonist treatment medications for opioid use disorder (OUD). A sizable proportion of the OUD treatment population is not exposed to sufficient treatment to attain the desired clinical benefit. Two promising therapeutic technologies address this deficit: long-acting injectable buprenorphine and personalised psychosocial interventions (PSI).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAmphetamine-type stimulants (ATS) are the second most commonly used class of illicit drugs globally, yet there is limited understanding of which factors contribute to different pathways of ATS use. We sought to compare current, former, and exposed non-ATS users' substance use, mental/physical health, and adverse life experiences. A cross-sectional survey, using computer-assisted personal interview software, was conducted between June 2018 and March 2019 in North East England.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAnaesthetists have a higher incidence of substance use disorder when compared with other doctors. This might be due to the ease of access to intravenous opioids, propofol, midazolam, inhalational agents and other anaesthetic drugs. Alcohol use disorder continues to be the most common problem.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground And Aims: Alcohol use increases throughout adolescence. Emergency department (ED) attendance is an opportunity for alcohol screening and brief intervention (ASBI), which is effective for adults. This trial evaluated the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of ASBI compared with screening alone (SA) in high-risk adolescents.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: Alcohol use by young people is associated with a range of psychological and physical harms. However, similar harms are also reported with disinhibitory conditions such as conduct problems that are said to precede and predispose to alcohol misuse. We explored whether alcohol use or indicators of underlying disinhibition predict psychological and physical harms in a cohort of young people.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAmphetamine Type Stimulants (ATS) are increasingly used drugs globally. There is limited evidence about what shapes ATS use at critical turning points located within drug using pathways. Using turning point theory, as part of a life course approach, the ATTUNE study aimed to understand which social, economic and individual factors shape pathways into and out of ATS use.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Alcohol consumption and related harm increase rapidly from the age of 12 years. We evaluated whether alcohol screening and brief intervention is effective and cost-effective in delaying hazardous or harmful drinking amongst low-risk or abstaining adolescents attending Emergency Departments (EDs).
Methods: This ten-centre, three-arm, parallel-group, single-blind, pragmatic, individually randomised trial screened ED attenders aged between 14 and 17 years for alcohol consumption.
Background: Heavy alcohol consumption is associated with an increased risk of postoperative complications and extended hospital stay. Alcohol consumption therefore represents a modifiable risk factor for surgical outcomes. Brief behavioural interventions have been shown to be effective in reducing alcohol consumption among increased risk and risky drinkers in other health-care settings and may offer a method of addressing preoperative alcohol consumption.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAims: To explore adolescents' experiences of consenting to, and participating in, alcohol intervention trials when attending for emergency care.
Methods: In-depth semi-structured interviews with 27 adolescents (16 males; aged 14-17 years (Mage = 15.7)) who had taken part in one of two linked brief alcohol intervention trials based in 10 accident and emergency departments in England.
Background And Aims: There is limited evidence on what shapes amphetamine-type stimulant (ATS) use trajectories. This systematic narrative review and qualitative synthesis aimed to identify individual, social and environmental influences shaping key phases in the ATS use trajectory: initiation, continuation, increase/relapse and decrease/abstinence.
Methods: MEDLINE, PsycINFO, EMBASE, and PROQUEST (social science premium collection) were searched from 2000 to 2018.
Background: Evidence suggests that increased preoperative alcohol consumption increases the risk of postoperative complications; therefore, a reduction or cessation in alcohol intake before surgery may reduce perioperative risk. Preoperative assessment presents an opportunity to intervene to optimise patients for surgery. This multicentre, two-arm, parallel group, individually randomised controlled trial will investigate whether a definitive trial of a brief behavioural intervention aimed at reducing preoperative alcohol consumption is feasible and acceptable to healthcare professionals responsible for its delivery and the preoperative elective orthopaedic patient population.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAims: There is a clear association between alcohol use and offending behaviour and significant police time is spent on alcohol-related incidents. This study aimed to test the feasibility of a trial of screening and brief intervention in police custody suites to reduce heavy drinking and re-offending behaviour.
Short Summary: We achieved target recruitment and high brief intervention delivery if this occurred immediately after screening.
Background: Between 5% and 30% of children in high-income countries live with a substance misusing parent, the majority of which is below dependent levels. However, little is understood about the impact of nondependent parental substance misuse upon children.
Methods: We searched the international literature using rigorous systematic methods to identify studies examining parental substance misuse and adverse outcomes in children.
Objective: To estimate and compare the optimal cut-off score of Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) and AUDIT-C in identifying at-risk alcohol consumption, heavy episodic alcohol use, ICD-10 alcohol abuse and alcohol dependence in adolescents attending ED in England.
Design: Opportunistic cross-sectional survey.
Setting: 10 emergency departments across England.
Irrespective of national guidelines for medical fitness to drive, this study investigated the cumulative expert wisdom of clinicians regarding minimum periods of driving cessation required for patients suffering from conditions that can impair driver capability. Occupational Physicians (196) and Psychiatrists (103) completed an online questionnaire. For private motorists, the modal response for anxiety and depression favoured clinical discretion, followed by three month cessations for hypomania, acute psychosis, schizophrenia and alcohol dependence and six weeks for alcohol misuse/dependence.
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