The Influence of Substance Use on Adolescent Brain Development - Daddy Tv

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ADOLESCENT SUBSTANCE USE AND NEUROCOGNITION

These brain adaptations often lead to the person becoming less and less able to derive pleasure from other things they once enjoyed, like food, sex, or social activities. They may mistakenly think that those who use drugs lack moral principles or willpower and that they could stop their drug use simply by choosing to. In reality, drug addiction is a complex disease, and quitting usually takes more than good intentions or a strong will. Fortunately, researchers know more than ever about how drugs affect the brain and have found treatments that can help people recover from drug addiction and lead productive lives.

Preventing and Recognizing Challenges

• However, the recently released Teen National Health Interview Survey (NHIS-Teen) surveyed adolescents (ages 12-17) directly, which allows for a more direct representation of adolescent mental health.
• This year, 13% of students who took the survey identified as Black or African American, 1% as American Indian or Alaska Native, 3% as Asian, 25% as Hispanic, 1% as Middle Eastern, 41% as white, and 16% as more than one of the preceding categories.

Prescription drug misuse while alone presents a significant risk for fatal overdose, especially given the proliferation of counterfeit pills resembling prescription drugs and containing illegal drugs (e.g., illegally manufactured fentanyl) (7). Education about harm reduction behaviors, such as using in the presence of others and expanding access to naloxone to all persons who use drugs, could reduce this risk. Jurisdictions were included if data were available for at least one 6-month period (July–December 2019, January–June 2020, July–December 2020, January–June 2021, or July–December 2021). The 2023 data continue to document stable or declining trends in the use of illicit drugs among young people over many years. However, importantly, other research has reported a dramatic rise in overdose deaths among teens between 2010 to 2021, which remained elevated well into 2022 according to a NIDA analysis of CDC and Census data.

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• “Screening adolescents for drug use is extremely important for early intervention and prevention of the development of substance use disorder,” said Nora Volkow, M.D., director of NIDA.
• The percentage of adolescents reporting substance use decreased significantly in 2021, according to the latest results from the Monitoring the Future survey of substance use behaviors and related attitudes among eighth, 10th, and 12th graders in the United States.
• While adults tend to get more subdued and slowed down by alcohol, in adolescents, it’s the opposite.

Additionally, marijuana, in combination with alcohol use, could have some neuroprotective effects, but further studies are warranted to examine this hypothesis. An alternative explanation is that alcohol and marijuana use may create opposing mechanisms (e.g., neuroinflammation and myelination suppression), so that macromorphometric variables may actually appear normal. Microstructural hippocampal changes related to marijuana use may include increased glial proliferation and white matter density as well as reduced gray matter, resulting in relatively normal hippocampal volumes despite functional pathology. Alternatively, heavy adolescent marijuana use may subtly interfere with synaptic pruning processes, resulting in larger gray matter volumes, particularly in the left hippocampus 32, 34. The current literature suggests that heavy drinking during adolescence does have a subtle, but significant, deleterious effects on adolescent neurocognitive functioning. Studies have found that adolescent heavy drinkers exhibit decrements in memory 24, attention and speeded information processing 25, 26, and executive functioning 27–29.

LGBQ+ adolescents are more likely to experience suicidal thoughts compared to their heterosexual peers. Data from YRBSS found that in 2021, higher shares of LGBQ+ adolescents reported serious thoughts of suicide (45% vs. 15%) and suicide attempts (22% vs. 6%) compared to heterosexual adolescents.5 Data on suicide deaths by LGBQ+ identity were not available. SAMHSA’s mission is to lead public health and service delivery efforts that promote mental health, prevent substance misuse, and provide treatments and supports to foster recovery while ensuring equitable access and better outcomes. Youth with substance use disorders also experience higher rates of physical and mental illnesses, diminished overall health and well-being, and potential progression to addiction.

Science News

• At the state and local level, initiatives to improve access to youth mental health care include promoting school-based Medicaid behavioral health services and connecting youth to virtual care at no cost.
• While there were no significant differences between users and non-users on neurocognitive test scores at the first time point, heavy drinkers performed worse on cognitive tasks at age 24 than light drinkers.
• Research has shown that heavy drinking during adolescence can lead to decreased performance on cognitive tasks of memory, attention, spatial skills, and executive functioning.
• The 2021 survey reported significant decreases in use across many substances, including those most commonly used in adolescence – alcohol, marijuana, and vaped nicotine.
• There are substance use disorder treatment programs for teens, but they are less commonly available than adult treatment programs.
• Additionally, in light of the COVID-19 pandemic, access and utilization of mental health care may have worsened.

Overall, 2,037 (91.3%) deaths involved at least one opioid; 1,871 (83.9%) involved IMFs, and 1,313 (58.9%) involved IMFs with no other opioids or stimulants. Approximately 10% of deaths involved prescription opioids, and 24.6% involved stimulants. There are substance use disorder treatment programs for teens, but they are less what is the best treatment for substance abuse for older adults commonly available than adult treatment programs. Your teen may benefit from residential substance use treatment if their use significantly impacts their safety and well-being, if they have a serious co-occurring mental health condition, or if they engage in behaviors that make it difficult for you or them to stay safe at home. Use the resources listed below to locate substance use and co-occurring treatment programs in your area.

• Use these free education and outreach materials in your community and on social media to spread the word about mental health and related topics.
• Harm reduction education specifically tailored to adolescents has the potential to discourage using substances while alone and teach how to recognize and respond to an overdose in others, which could thereby prevent overdoses that occur when adolescents use drugs with friends from becoming fatal.
• SAMHSA offers free, downloadable publications and tip sheets, as well as mobile apps for youth, teens, and young adults on topics such as substance misuse, common mental health conditions, and coping with disasters and other traumatic events.
• The Monitoring the Future survey is conducted by researchers at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), part of the National Institutes of Health.

While adults tend to get more subdued and slowed down by alcohol, in adolescents, it’s the opposite. They tend to become more energetic, engage in more risky behavior and get more aggressive. If they’re not treated, almost half of kids with mental health disorders will end up having a substance use disorder. It’s OK to stay away from drugs and alcohol if they negatively affect you or if you’re simply not interested in trying them. Don’t be afraid to be honest with friends and family that use substances; tell them that you’d prefer not to or choose to spend time with them when drugs and alcohol aren’t involved. While the completed survey from 2021 represents about 75% of the sample size of a typical year’s data collection, the results were gathered from a broad geographic and representative sample, so the data were statistically weighted to provide national numbers.