Prescription Stimulants
Prescription stimulant medications are often prescribed to treat children, adolescents, or adults diagnosed with attention-deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). College students are known to abuse prescription stimulants to increase alertness, attention, energy, and heart rate to cram for tests, lose weight, or to get high. Research actually shows, though, that students who abuse prescription drugs do worse in school than students who don’t and increase their likelihood of becoming addicted to them.
What are Amphetamines?
Types of Prescription Amphetamines:
How Are Amphetamines Used?
Health Effects of Stimulants
- Increased alertness, attention, energy
- Increased blood pressure and heart rate
- Narrowed blood vessels
- Increased blood sugar
- Opened-up breathing passages
- Malnourishment
In high doses, dangerously high body temperature, irregular heartbeat, heart failure, and seizures can be fatal. In combination with alcohol, stimulants mask the depressant action of alcohol, increasing the risk of alcohol overdose and may increase blood pressure and jitters.
Long-Term Effects:
- Heart problems
- Psychosis
- Anger
- Paranoia
- Convulsions
- Addiction
The number of prescriptions for some of these medications has increased dramatically since the early 1990s. Unintentional overdose deaths involving opioid pain relievers have quadrupled since 1999, and by 2007, outnumbered those involving heroin and cocaine. The average age of first use is 21 years old.
The continued abuse of amphetamines will render the user unable to sustain a lot of activity, causing the abuser to crash. The effects of amphetamines on the abuser’s personality are just as sheer as the physical effects, often causing deteriorations of the abuser’s behavior or appearance.
How Stimulants Work
Like all stimulant drugs, prescription stimulants increase levels of dopamine in the brain. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter associated with pleasure, movement, and attention. When taken as directed, prescription stimulants produce slow, steady increases in dopamine in the brain. Scientists think that these gradual increases may help to correct abnormal dopamine signaling that may occur in the brains of those who are diagnosed with ADHD.
Amphetamine physical symptoms quickly set in causing the brain and the body to go through a series of uncomfortable reactions.
- Oversleeping
- Excessive hunger
- Pain and discomfort
- Lack of coordination
- Shaking
- Seizure
- Dehydration
- Cardiac Arrest
Amphetamine psychological symptoms begin from the extensive drug high followed by a crash and burn cycle that includes extreme fatigue and extended periods of inactivity.
- Irritability
- Short temper
- Cravings
- Hallucinations
- Sensory and auditory misperception
- Extreme mood swings
- Suicidal ideation
- Psychosis
Stimulant Withdrawal Symptoms
Withdrawals from prescription stimulants of any kind can cause many physical and mental issues that may not subside quickly and can sometimes last several months or longer. Various stimulant withdrawal symptoms are listed:
- Powerful craving for more
- Sleep disturbances (insomnia and narcolepsy)
- Intense hunger
- Anxiety and Irritability
- Panic attacks
- Fatigue
- Depression
- Suicidal thoughts
Amphetamine Withdrawal
Studies have found that full-time college students, between the ages of 18 and 22, were twice as likely to abuse amphetamines than those of the same age not in college.
Individuals using amphetamines non-medically in college were also:
- Three times more likely to have used marijuana in the past year
- Eight times more likely to have used cocaine
- Five times more likely to have used painkillers non-medically
- 90% were reported binge drinkers and more than 50% were reported to be heavy drinkers
Prescription Stimulants Addiction Treatment in Port St. Lucie, FL
By increasing awareness and promoting additional research on prescription drug abuse, and when prescription stimulants are not abused, the proper medications can be part of a beneficial treatment plan for individuals with severe ADHD and other medical conditions.
Real, lasting recovery involves intensive therapeutic addiction treatments that tackle the physical, emotional and spiritual aspects of the addiction.
If you or your loved one have become addicted to prescription stimulants, visit our admissions processing page to start your path of recovery today.
To get on the road to recovery today, call (866)-778-7470 or contact us now.
Dr. Alam is an internationally renowned psychiatrist with academic affiliations with Northwestern University and University of Illinois, Chicago where he completed his residency training. He has been a principal investigator for over forty studies and has been involved in research leading to the approval of most psychiatric medications currently on the market. He is the founder of the Neuroscience Research Institute which continues to conduct research on cutting edge medication and interventional psychiatry. Dr. Alam is a Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and the American Society of Addiction Medicine. He has won several awards and has been featured extensively on radio and television.
