This program is brought to you by Emory University. [BLANK_AUDIO] >> Now we come to one of the most important topics in drug abuse and addiction. That topic is treatment. Drug abuse can be very difficult to stop and relapsing is highly probable. Also, the disease itself impairs the ability to make judgements and reduces the ability to make free decisions. It affects the brain, so treatment is essential. Treatment is a lifeline to those who are experiencing the negative consequences of this disease and who are having difficulties stopping. It's been shown in many studies that treatment can cut drug use in half. It can reduce criminal behavior up to 80%. It can reduce arrests up to 64%. And it reduces the cost of drug-related crime. Treatment has proven to be effective and is not a waste of time. In fact, for a drug user, it can be the very best possible use of time. How do we define treatment? Treatment is a set of activities, such as taking medications or changing behaviors, with the goal or reducing or eliminating drug use. It can be as broad and as varied as the drug problem itself. Addiction is a very complex disorder and treatment must address these complexities. Treatment is not threatening. Those seeking treatment will not be put into jail. They will not be restrained and forced to undergo painful withdrawal. The individual and their wishes and goals are respected in treatment. A major concern about someone entering treatment has to do with confidentiality. They may have concerns like, who will know? I don't want be known as an addict. I'll lose my job. Treatment is confidential and what happens in treatment is private. Sometimes we encounter very surprising attitudes about addicts. Some people might say, why bother with treating them, they're only addicts? This attitude is without compassion, without the knowledge that addiction is a brain disorder or disease and without the realization that treatment exists and works. Also, those with this attitude lack an appreciation of the many benefits of treatment, such as savings in money and misery. Further, this attitude reflects the stigma of addiction. Addiction is not a moral failing, but one of many complex physiologic disorders that must be treated. Let's talk more about the stigma of drug addiction. Stigma is very important in this field. Stigma is an attitude of disgust associated with addiction, and it often turns out to be a cruel attitude. It's due mainly to a lack of information and rationality. Importantly, stigma prevents us from providing treatment because we want to avoid the problem and avoid the topic. Another important part of the problem of stigma is that it prevents an addict from coming forward to get treatment. They're afraid and in denial of their own problem. Therefore, overcoming and reducing the stigma around addiction is a major goal in public health. Some are very surprised that addiction can be compared to other chronic diseases that have little stigma. There include cardiovascular disease, asthma, diabetes and others. Let's compare addiction to one of the cardiovascular diseases, atherosclerosis. Both addiction and atherosclerosis are serious health problems. Both kinds of patients can be at least partly blamed for their own role in the disease, in their own decisions and actions. Both have a likely biologic or genetic vulnerability to the disease. Both diseases can be slowly progressing and are chronic. Relapses occur in both, and dealing with both can require a change in lifestyle. The table uses examples to compare the two diseases on the basis of medications, change behaviors and the development of new behaviors. The cardiovascular disease finds medications very useful to lower cholesterol, for example. In addiction, medications are helpful to reduce cravings, for example. In one, you have to change your behavior to avoid fatty foods and control your weight. In the other, you have to avoid drugs and drug users. New behaviors are needed. In one, you have to start exercising and dieting perhaps. In the other, you have to attend to coexisting health problems, and it's clear that treatment, while different, helps both diseases. So let me briefly summarize. Addiction is a brain disorder or disease like many other diseases associated with other organs. Addiction compares in many ways to atherosclerosis, for example, and other chronic relapsing diseases. There's no inherent reason for addiction to have any stigma. Stigma itself is a problem that needs to be overcome.
