Wednesday, April 7, 2010 as of 11:14 AM ET
An opioid is a psychoactive chemical that works by binding to opioid receptors, which are found principally in the central and peripheral nervous system and the gastrointestinal tract.
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When a new patient comes into Dr.
Shawn Jones' office in Paducah, Kentucky complaining of pain and asks for a specific drug without talking about other symptoms, Jones gets suspicious."The first thing they say is they're in horrible pain and they need pain medicine," said Jones. "The other thing that gives it away is they want to tell you what works - they tell you they want Percocet. They don't talk about their symptoms - they don't say, 'Oh, two weeks ago I hurt my back.'"These are the types of red flags that can send Kentucky doctors to check a state database to see if a patient is "doctor shopping" for addictive painkillers.. A CDC report last year said 15,000 people died as a result of overdoses of prescription painkillers in 2008 - more than three times the number in 1999.Kentucky is a hot spot. Nearly 1,000 people in the state died from prescription drug overdoses in 2010, or about three a day, ranking it among the top states for such deaths.In America as a whole, about 12 milli...U.S. health officials warned on Thursday about the sometimes deadly effect of overexposure to fentanyl painkiller patches, particularly for small children, saying at...
EXCLUSIVE: A new designer drug called krokodil -- a derivative of morphine that can turn an addict's skin greenish, scaly and cause it to rot away -- is being eyed...
A drug cartel lieutenant has been detained in a series of firebombing attacks on Mexican potato-chip company Sabritas, a subsidiary of U.S. food giant PepsiCo. Busin...
Afghan forces are being trained by the U.S. military to take over the mission by 2014, but new documents obtained by Judicial Watch through a request under the Freed...
Health agencies and drug counselors are warning of a dramatic and dangerous rise in the abuse of medicines containing the narcotic hydrocodone, including Vicodin, No...
The head of Germany's central bank says there is no quick fix for Europe's problems, calling appeals for more support from the European Central Bank and plans for in...
Expect the unexpected—such is my life with cancer. My white cell count was too low, below one, so the doctor could not administer my chemotherapy treatment last week...
Morphine and similar powerful painkillers are sometimes prescribed to recent war veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress along with physical pain, and the cons...
Morphine and similar powerful painkillers are sometimes prescribed to recent war veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress along with physical pain, and the cons...
"Britain's heaviest teenager," who is believed to weigh more than 700 pounds (318kg), had to have part of her house demolished because she was too big to leave it.A ...
A physician accused of illegally selling prescriptions for the powerful painkiller oxycodone out of his car surrendered Thursday to face federal drug conspiracy char...
Steve Wohlen lay on his front lawn, blue, unconscious and barely breathing, overdosing on heroin.His mother ran outside, frantically assembling a pen-like canister. ...
Drug companies are working to develop a pure, more powerful version of the nation's second most-abused medicine, which has addiction experts worried that it could sp...
A second drug company has confirmed it plans to market a new form of the powerful and addictive painkiller hydrocodone, worrying experts who fear a narcotics "arms r...
At the Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit, pharmacists are using old-fashioned paper spreadsheets to track their stock of drugs in short supply - a task that takes sever...
Drug companies are working to develop a pure, more powerful version of a highly abused medicine, which has addiction experts worried that it could spur a new wave of...
The U.S. Army has investigated 56 soldiers in Afghanistan on suspicion of using or distributing heroin, morphine or other opiates during 2010 and 2011, newly obtaine...
WASHINGTON -- The U.S. Army has investigated 56 soldiers in Afghanistan on suspicion of using or distributing heroin, morphine or other opiates during 2010 and 2011,...
The number of American soldiers seeking treatment for opiate abuse has skyrocketed over the past five years, at a time when the U.S. military has been surging forces...
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