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 Among our population, the elderly tend to be more vulnerable to prescription drug abuse and prescription drug addiction than the younger population. While most people tend to use prescription medications as prescribed, an estimated 48 million people (ages 12 and older) have used prescription drugs as they have seen fit in their lifetimes. This represents approximately 20 percent of the U.S. population who have abused prescription medication.
To further demonstrate the extent of prescription medication abuse, a 2004 National Institute on Drug Abuse's (NIDA's) Monitoring the Future survey of 8th, 10th, and 12th-graders found that 9.3 percent of 12th graders reported using Vicodin without a prescription in the past year, and 5.0 percent reported using OxyContin, making these medications among the most commonly abused prescription drugs by adolescents.
The abuse of certain prescription medication such as opioids, a central nervous system (CNS) depressants, and stimulants- can alter the brain's activity and lead to prescription drug addiction. We believe the rise in prescription drug abuse is directly linked to accessibility. In conjunction with prescription medication being prescribed quite freely by pain clinics throughout the country, the greatest jump in prescription medication abuse is
due to easy access over the Internet.
Prescription drug addiction may be defined as a pattern of compulsive drug use characterized by a continued craving for drugs and the need to use these drugs for psychological effects or mood alterations. Many that are addicted to prescription medication feel that because the medication was prescribed that it is ok, even though they continually abuse the prescription medication.
Those that are addicted to prescription medication exhibit drug seeking behavior and
are often preoccupied with using and obtaining their prescription medication of choice. The American Society of Addiction Medicine considers addiction “a disease process characterized by the continued use of a specific psychoactive substance despite physical, psychological or social harm.”
According to the Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN), fourteen of the top twenty most abused controlled substances in the United States, are prescription drugs. Benzodiazepines rank highest on the list, and are followed by the opiates or painkillers.
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