Heroin Use and Abuse

Heroin (medical name diamorphine) is one of a group of drugs called 'opiates', and is made from morphine. During the last half of the nineteenth century many people were maintained on morphine by their physicians to treat pain or chronic anxiety. But while morphine passes relatively slowly from the blood into the brain, heroin floods the brain instantly after its injection into a vein. This property made heroin attractive for those who sought its euphoriant actions, and thus heroin became the opiate of first choice for addicts everywhere, and its use was widespread by the early part of the twentieth century. With the increasing use of heroin, a complex reality has emerged: while some of the experimenters will try heroin and never use it again, many of them will become abusers and many of these will develop an addiction to it.

So, distinction can be made between heroin use and abuse and heroin addiction, although there is a great risk of becoming dependent on heroin when this substance is abused. Heroin use and abuse is a matter of an interaction among the person, the drug and the circumstances, and it is related to the harmful aspects of the use of heroin.

Because of the properties of heroin to relieve emotional and physical pain, it often becomes an easy target for abuse by someone who may be experiencing emotional and psychological disturbances, because heroin produces euphoria or pleasurable feelings and can be a positive reinforcer by interacting with the reward pathway in the brain. This does not necessarily mean that the person is dependent on heroin. It could be a time limited use and abuse pattern that may or may not disappear whenever the difficulties are behind him/her.

Summing up, heroin use and abuse is different from heroin dependence, although abuse often leads to dependence. Abusers are not necessarily addicted to heroin, but develop problems as a result of their heroin consumption and poor judgment, failure to understand the risks, or lack of concern about injury to themselves or others.

Physical Effects of Heroin Use

There are enormous medical complications associated with heroin use and abuse. Medical consequences of chronic heroin abuse include scarred and/or collapsed veins, bacterial infections of the blood vessels and heart valves, abscesses (boils) and other soft-tissue infections, and liver or kidney disease. Lung complications (including various types of pneumonia and tuberculosis) may result from the poor health condition of the abuser as well as from heroin's depressing effects on respiration. Many of the additives in street heroin may include substances that do not readily dissolve and result in clogging the blood vessels that lead to the lungs, liver, kidneys, or brain. This can cause infection or even death of small patches of cells in vital organs. Immune reactions to these or other contaminants can cause arthritis or other rheumatologic problems.

Of course, sharing of injection equipment or fluids can lead to some of the most severe consequences of heroin abuse-infections with hepatitis B and C, HIV, and a host of other blood-borne viruses, which drug abusers can then pass on to their sexual partners and children.

Heroin Detox Center (Opiates):

� TAVAD - Advanced Addiction Treatments
  Ultra Rapid Heroin Detox Treatment.
100% successful detox without Withdrawal in 48 hours.
  (Treatments evaluated by Ministry of Health) - UROD (Ultra Rapid Opiates Detox)
  Heroin detox clinic

For Further Information about Heroin Use and Abuse:

NIDA. Research Report Series. Heroin abuse and addiction

Cocaine Abuse and Cocaine Addiction