Co-founder of The New Face of Recovery™ uses personal experience to challenge the idea that addiction is an incurable brain disease.
Clearwater, FL (PRWEB) December 31, 2009 — In the 1950’s alcoholism was voted on as being a disease by the American Medical Association (AMA) and has since been promoted as such, citing there are common characteristics with other diseases. Even today, the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAA) classifies alcoholism as a brain disease and claims it cannot be cured.
However, more than 50 years have passed and even with the most advanced clinical testing there is still no solid proof that addiction is an incurable disease. Brain scans can’t take a sober person who was once labeled as an alcoholic and tell that he has a disease, and there is no blood test to identify someone either. The same holds true with many other mental disorders.
“I was a classic alcoholic with major depression and social anxiety,” explains Lucas A Catton, CCDC, co-founder of the advocacy group The New Face of Recovery ™, “However, it’s been more than a decade since I have displayed any of those symptoms and I will personally give $1,000 to any doctor, psychiatrist, government official or pharmaceutical company that can prove that I have an incurable brain disease.”
Catton says what helped him beat his addiction was a non-traditional program that was long-term and drug-free, which is the type of programs his group supports now as being the most effective. The advocacy group points out that results should be what matters most in addiction recovery, looking at all areas of life including happiness at home, employment and productivity at work, activity in groups, churches and other social settings in addition to measuring sobriety.
The New Face of Recovery movement also says that the use of certain prescription drugs should be a part of this measurement, especially any mind-altering substances, as many of the drugs prescribed in today’s treatment centers still leave people dependent on drugs in their daily lives. In addition, drug and alcohol rehabs that tell their clients they have an incurable disease and give them replacement drugs typically have higher relapse rates.
More addiction treatment centers lately have been using the holistic buzzword and not following the disease theory of addiction, although there are several different types of rehabilitation methods even in the non-traditional category. To find out more information about successful drug rehab centers visit www.newfaceofrecovery.org.
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From: http://www.prweb.com/releases/addiction/recovery/prweb3391314.htm
Advocacy group says putting drug abusers on more drugs is not a real solution for rehabilitation.
Alcoholism and drug addiction are not new, but a few decades ago they were labeled as diseases, and now there are millions of Americans being prescribed drugs that have abuse potential, heavy mental and physical side effects and may even be fatal.
The scary, inbred connection with the pharmaceutical industry and doctors has led to the current disastrous epidemic of prescription drug addiction, with legal drugs killing more people in many states than illicit substances. Despite this undisputable evidence of carnage, the majority of doctors and addiction treatment centers continue to prescribe more drugs to addicts instead of helping them end the problem permanently.
One of the most common examples includes opioid replacement therapy for people who are addicted to drugs like heroin and oxycodone. These drugs often include buprenorphine or methadone, yet each are variations of synthetic opiates themselves and if taken over any substantial length of time require treatment just to get off them. There is also the fact that many states are seeing a significant rise in methadone and other opiate-related deaths.
Another commonly accepted practice includes an array of psychotropic drugs like anti-anxiety medication, antidepressants and atypical antipsychotics. However, sedatives such as benzodiazepines to cope with anxiety have an extremely high potential for abuse in themselves, antidepressants have been proven to cause erratic behavior and antipsychotics have been linked to causing diabetes, among other side effects.
“People seeking rehabilitation help for alcohol and other drug addictions are feeling lost and betrayed,” comments New Face of Recovery™ founding member Lucas A Catton, “They pay money to go to these treatment centers
with the hope of getting better, but many of the end up worse because of the drugs they are given there.”
Catton says he has personally spoken with thousands of people throughout the country in recent years who share this sentiment and who are seeking a more effective form of rehabilitation program. This continuing pattern is what led to the formation of the New Face of Recovery as a patient advocacy group seeking to improve conditions in the addiction treatment field.
Tags: addiction treatment centers, drug replacement therapy, prescription drug addiction
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November 22nd, 2009
Like with other fields in health care, drug rehab and addiction treatment centers ultimately have to make money somehow to keep operating. Most of these facilities are non-profits, so they don’t make a lot of money, but for those that are for-profit and even some that receive government funding, it can be a major source of revenue. It usually depends on how they view addiction and whether or not they believe that permanent recovery is possible.
High-priced for-profit centers can charge 40K per month and offer a nice place to live and some counseling with plenty of activities and a private chef. Those places are often more like a month-long vacations for relaxation to get away for a bit than true recovery centers that get results.
At the lower end of the spectrum are treatment facilities and counseling programs that accept state and federal money to provide services for people who can’t afford to pay. While this is a much-needed gap to fill, most of these programs actually spend more time on filing the paperwork to keep their contracts than making sure clients remain sober – and it’s totally acceptable since the government thinks addition is an incurable disease – how ridiculous!
Somewhere in between it all, there are successful drug and alcohol rehabs that are able to demonstrate that addiction can be cured and that permanent recovery is possible. These are the programs that we support.
Tags: addiction recovery, addiction treatment, drug rehabs, treatment facilities
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November 6th, 2009
In its latest Treatment Episode Data set (TEDS) report, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) found that the criminal justice system was the largest single source of referrals to substance abuse treatment, accounting for 37 percent of all admissions (approximately 671,000 of the 1.8 million admissions).
Five primary substances of abuse accounted for 96 percent of all substance abuse treatments admissions in 2007: alcohol, opiates (including heroin and prescription painkillers), marijuana, cocaine, and methamphetamine. Criminal justice system referrals were more likely than all other referral admissions to report primary alcohol abuse, marijuana abuse, methamphetamine abuse, and less likely to report primary opiate abuse.
While it is great to see the criminal justice system doing more referrals for addiction treatment instead of incarceration, it is still disturbing that only about ten percent of all admissions are into inpatient drug rehabs, and only about six percent go into long-term rehab programs. When the recovery method used is then taken into account, the number of people who remain drug-free out of the nearly two million admissions is shocking.
For more information on successful addiction treatment and recovery programs, contact us today by calling 1-877-372-5719.
Tags: addiction treatment, inpatient drug rehabs, long-term rehab programs
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