Introduction: Self-mutilation is direct and deliberate harm to one's body without conscious intent to die. It is observed in both men and women with various psychiatric disorders, but most of those who self-mutilate are women diagnosed with borderline personality disorder. Cocaine addiction is a significant worldwide public health problem, associated with somatic, psychological, psychiatric, socioeconomic and legal complications. Amphetamine use, but not cocaine use, has previously been associated with severe self-injurious behavior.
Case: We report here a case of a female patient with recurring self-injurious behavior ("the pleasure of bleeding") induced by cocaine abuse.
Discussion: The clinical characteristics of self-mutilation are manifold and there is a lack of agreement about its etiology. The complex behavior associated with cocaine abuse may be one cause of self-mutilation. Dysfunction of the inhibitory brain circuitry caused by drug addiction could explain why this cocaine-addicted patient loses control and self-mutilates during cocaine use.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.lpm.2006.10.025 | DOI Listing |
Pharmaceuticals (Basel)
January 2025
Department of Basic Sciences, Ponce Research Institute, Ponce Health Sciences University, Ponce, PR 00716, USA.
Background/objectives: Cocaine use disorder is an intersecting issue in populations with HIV-1, further exacerbating the clinical course of the disease and contributing to neurotoxicity and neuroinflammation. Cocaine and HIV neurotoxins play roles in neuronal damage during neuroHIV progression by disrupting glutamate homeostasis in the brain. Even with combined antiretroviral therapy (cART), HIV-1 Nef, an early viral protein expressed in approximately 1% of infected astrocytes, remains a key neurotoxin.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMicroorganisms
January 2025
Department of Physiology, School of Medicine, Wayne State University, Detroit, MI 48201, USA.
Cocaine use disorder remains a major global health concern, with growing evidence that the gut microbiome modulates drug-related behaviors. This study examines the microbiome's role in cocaine-induced psychomotor activation and context-dependent reward responses using germ-free (GF) and antibiotic-treated (ABX) models. In GF mice, the absence of a microbiome blunted cocaine-induced psychomotor activation ( = 0.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFActa Odontol Scand
January 2025
Associate Laboratory i4HB-Institute for Health and Bioeconomy, University Institute of Health Sciences-CESPU, Gandra 4585-116, Portugal; UCIBIO-Applied Molecular Biosciences Unit, Translational Toxicology Research Laboratory, University Institute of Health Sciences (1H-TOXRUN, IUCS-CESPU), Gandra, Portugal.
Background: The dependence on the illicit drugs has been proven to be harmful to the oral cavity and may lead to a series of abnormal manifestations. The main objective of this study was to observe the effects caused by the consumption of illicit drugs in the oral cavity, in a prison population in the North of Portugal.
Methods: A cross-sectional observational study was conducted involving 91 male inmates aged 25-75 years (mean age 41.
ACS Chem Neurosci
January 2025
School of Pharmacy, University of Wisconsin─Madison, Madison, Wisconsin 53705, United States.
Addiction to psychostimulants, including cocaine, causes widespread morbidity and mortality and is a major threat to global public health. Currently, no pharmacotherapies can successfully treat psychostimulant addiction. The neuroactive effects of cocaine and other psychostimulants have been studied extensively with respect to their modulation of monoamine systems (particularly dopamine); effects on neuropeptide systems have received less attention.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNPJ Vaccines
January 2025
School of Chemistry and Molecular Biosciences, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia.
Cyclic peptides are often used as scaffolds for the multivalent presentation of drug molecules due to their structural stability and constrained conformation. We identified a cyclic deca-peptide incorporating lipoamino acids for delivering T helper and B cell epitopes against group A Streptococcus (GAS), eliciting robust humoral immune responses. In this study, we assessed the function-immunogenicity relationship of the multi-component vaccine candidate (referred to as VC-13) to elucidate a mechanism of action.
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