31 results match your criteria: "Alcohol Centre[Affiliation]"

Aims: Substance use disorders (SUD) are associated with cognitive deficits that are not always addressed in current treatments, and this hampers recovery. Cognitive training and remediation interventions are well suited to fill the gap for managing cognitive deficits in SUD. We aimed to reach consensus on recommendations for developing and applying these interventions.

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Background: Opioids and stimulants are the most commonly injected illicit drugs worldwide and in Australia. While some people who inject drugs (PWID) prefer either opioids or stimulants, others regularly use both opioids and stimulants. Limited available research indicates that those who use opioids and stimulants together, either in combination or alternating between the two, may engage in injection-related practices which potentially place them at greater health risk and could lead to poorer health outcomes.

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The use of electronic cigarettes (EC) is increasing and the number of EC publications is rapidly growing. While some health organizations focus on the harmful effects of using EC (vaping), others promote the benefits of ECs as a less harmful alternative to smoking tobacco. There is concern that vaping might have adverse respiratory consequences for pediatric patients facing anesthesia and intensive care.

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Objective: The study objective was to identify the analgesic efficacy of three different pharmacological strategies in patients receiving methadone or buprenorphine as opioid agonist treatment (OAT). The three pharmacological approaches, a) increasing maintenance methadone/buprenorphine dose by 30%, b) adding oxycodone, or c) adding a single dose of gabapentin, were compared with a control condition of the participant's usual OAT dose.

Design: A randomized, controlled, double-blinded, double-dummy, within-subject crossover study.

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Prevalence and co-occurrence of unhealthy lifestyle habits and behaviours among secondary school students in Tuscany, central Italy.

Public Health

January 2019

Cancer Research "Attilia Pofferi" Foundation, Pistoia, 51100, Italy. Electronic address:

Objectives: Unhealthy habits acquired during adolescence may persist in adulthood and eventually increase the risk of chronic illnesses.

Study Design: We reported on a survey conducted in 2013-2015 among secondary school students in Tuscany, central Italy.

Methods: We compared the prevalence of self-reported lifestyle characteristics and overweight/obesity between genders and age groups (14-16 vs 17-21 years).

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Routine opioid outcome monitoring in community pharmacy: Pilot implementation study protocol.

Res Social Adm Pharm

August 2019

National Drug and Alcohol Centre, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia; Drug Policy Modelling Program, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia.

Background: Increases in opioid use and related harms such as mortality are occurring in many high income countries. Community pharmacists are often in contact with patients at risk of opioid-related harm and represent an ideal point for intervention. Best practice in monitoring opioid-related outcomes involves assessing analgesia, pain functioning, mood, risks and harms associated with opioid use.

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Childhood trauma: psychiatry's greatest public health challenge?

Lancet Public Health

July 2017

National Drug and Alcohol Centre, UNSW Australia, Randwick, NSW, Australia; Department of Psychiatry, UNSW Australia, Black Dog Institute, Randwick, NSW, Australia.

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Issues: Numerous studies and systematic reviews have concluded that naloxone for take-home use is an effective intervention to reduce overdose morbidity and mortality, with few side effects and no abuse potential. One barrier to supply is that naloxone has traditionally been a prescription medication. In May 2015, the Therapeutic Goods Administration of Australia announced the intention to down-schedule naloxone when used for the treatment of opioid overdose, enabling sale in pharmacies without a prescription.

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Clinical Question: Are different opioid agonist treatments (eg, methadone vs buprenorphine) associated with differences in efficacy for treating prescription opioid dependence, and is long-term maintenance of opioid agonist treatment associated with differences in efficacy compared with opioid taper or psychological treatments alone?

Bottom Line: For patients who are dependent on prescription opioids, long-term maintenance of opioid agonists is associated with less prescription opioid use and better adherence to medication and psychological therapies for opioid dependence compared with opioid taper or psychological treatments alone. Methadone maintenance was not associated with differences in therapeutic efficacy compared with buprenorphine maintenance treatment. Evidence quality was low to moderate.

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Background: The potential of methamphetamine, and high-potency crystal methamphetamine in particular, to precipitate psychotic symptoms and psychotic illness is the subject of much speculation internationally. Established psychotic illness is disabling for individuals and costly to society. The aim of this study was to investigate whether use of crystal methamphetamine was associated with greater prevalence of self-reported psychotic illness, compared to use of other forms of methamphetamine.

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Aims: This study examines the type of alcohol-related problems that commonly occur before the onset of depressive experiences to shed light on the mechanisms underlying the alcohol-depression comorbidity relationship.

Methods: Data were from the 1992 USA National Longitudinal Alcohol Epidemiologic Survey. Analytical sample comprised of drinkers with a prior to past year (PPY) history of alcohol-related problems with or without any experiences of depressed mood in the past year (PY).

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Introduction: Use of opioid agonist treatments for prescription opioid (PO) dependence is rapidly increasing. Current guidelines are based on research with heroin users. This study aimed to examine methadone and buprenorphine dose requirements for PO-dependent people.

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Aims: To test if polysubstance use profiles and drug-related outcomes differ between those receiving and not receiving opioid substitution therapies (OST) among people who inject drugs (PWID).

Design: An annual cross-sectional, sentinel sample of PWID across Australia.

Setting: Data came from 3 years (2011-13) of the Illicit Drug Reporting System (IDRS).

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Objective: Group norms and drinking motives are crucial predictors of adolescents' alcohol intake. The current study examined the role of drinking motives in the association between descriptive group norms and alcohol intake.

Method: A sample of 525 Italian adolescents (56% men) was surveyed.

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Study Objective: Sleep disturbance is a hallmark feature of cannabis withdrawal. In this study we explored the effects of lithium treatment supplemented with nitrazepam on objective and subjective measures of sleep quality during inpatient cannabis withdrawal.

Methods: Treatment-seeking cannabis-dependent adults (n = 38) were admitted for 8 days to an inpatient withdrawal unit and randomized to either oral lithium (500 mg) or placebo, twice daily in a double-blind RCT.

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Introduction And Aims: Codeine dependence is an emerging public health concern, yet no studies have specifically examined the treatment of codeine dependence. Given the lower potency of codeine it cannot be assumed that buprenorphine dose requirements for heroin dependence will generalise to codeine. This is the first study to examine buprenorphine treatment for codeine dependence.

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Background: This study investigates whether the type, nature or amount of polysubstance use can explain the increased risk of non-fatal overdose among people who inject drugs with severe psychological distress.

Methods: Data came from three years (2011-2013) of the Illicit Drug Reporting System (IDRS), an annual sentinel sample of injecting drug users across Australia (n=2673). Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) was used on 14 drug types to construct five latent factors, each representing a type of polysubstance use.

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Implementing real-time prescription drug monitoring: are we ready?

Drug Alcohol Rev

September 2014

National Drug and Alcohol Centre, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia; Drug and Alcohol Services, South Eastern Sydney Local Health District, Sydney, Australia.

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Background: There is growing empirical and clinical consensus that many psychiatric disorders are continuous in nature. The DSM-5 however makes a categorical distinction between subthreshold and threshold cases of generalized anxiety disorder (GAD). This study tested the a priori assumption that the DSM-5 criteria identify a break in psychopathology between subthreshold and threshold cases of GAD.

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Brief Intervention (BI) for hazardous drinkers at a Primary Health Care (PHC) level can be implemented during the interaction between a GP and his/her client in a range of contexts and opportunities, the GP's office being a primary context. Communication skills are needed for professionals in order to deliver the BI and they should be familiar with motivational interviewing. This pilot study, carried out during 2006-2007, observed how GPs are able to effectively communicate with their hazardous drinking clients when implementing BI.

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The most common alcohol-related chronic condition for hospitalisation is alcohol dependence which can lead to an alcohol withdrawal syndrome (AWS). The aim of this paper is to report on a quality improvement program in an Australian rural area health service for the screening and management of alcohol withdrawal and the effect of two types of nursing education and training approaches: a self-directed competency training package and a more traditional in-service program. The measure of improvement was compliance to nine clinical standards or core competencies for the assessment and treatment of the AWS derived from the Clinical Institute Withdrawal Assessment for Alcohol-Revised (CIWA-Ar) scale and the NSW drug and alcohol withdrawal clinical practice guidelines.

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The aim of the present study was to obtain information about both drinking and smoking, as well as about alcohol consumption-related problems, among Albanians who have immigrated to Florence, Italy, after the collapse of the Communist regime in 1990. Between October 2001 and January 2002, an opportunistic sample of 141 Albanians living in the city of Florence were interviewed about their alcohol and tobacco use, as well as about their drinking pattern and health problems Interviewees were mainly (81%) males, of an average age of 28, who had been living in Italy for the last 4 years; 92.9% drank alcoholic beverages, the preferred beverages were wine and liquor, and the average daily consumption was 39.

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A community project aiming to promote responsible drinking and to prevent alcohol use-related problems in three districts of Scandicci, a town west of Florence, was undertaken between 2000 and 2004. The community totaled 21,851 residents. Among other initiatives, 8,000 carousels that provided information on different levels of alcohol consumption and more than 1,000 prints of nine drawings by local school children that promoted moderate consumption were distributed in the community, respectively, during February-July 2002 and May-June 2003.

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