Narcotic Abuse

• Narcotic Abuse Overview
• Narcotic Abuse Causes
• Narcotic Abuse Symptoms
• When to Seek Medical Care
• Exams and Tests
• Narcotic Abuse Treatment
• Next Steps
• Outlook
• Support Groups and Counseling
• For More Information
• Web Links
• Synonyms and Keywords
• Authors and Editors

Narcotic Abuse Overview

Pain is one of the most common reasons people seek medical treatment. Doctors can prescribe several different drugs to relieve pain. The most potent pain-relieving drugs are narcotics.

In the United States, narcotics are widely prescribed. When prescribed for medical conditions, narcotics are often prescribed to treat pain. They are often given after or offered along with less-potent or less-effective pain relievers.

However, narcotic use is considered abuse when people use narcotics to seek feelings of well-being apart from the narcotic's pain-relief applications.

• Morphine and other natural derivatives of the opium poppy (such as codeine and heroin) are called opiates. Drugs such as heroin and methadone are called semisynthetic drugs. Some drugs, including endorphins, occur naturally in the body, producing a morphinelike effect. Opiates, synthetic drugs, semisynthetic drugs, and drugs created naturally by the body comprise the class of drugs known as opioids or narcotics.

• The most commonly abused narcotic is heroin. Other narcotics include methadone, meperidine (Demerol), morphine, codeine, hydromorphone (Dilaudid), fentanyl, hydrocodone, and oxycodone (Percocet, Percodan).

Narcotics have many useful pain-relieving applications in medicine. They are used not only to relieve pain for people with chronic diseases such as cancer, but also to relieve pain after operations. Doctors may also prescribe narcotics for painful acute conditions, such as corneal abrasions, kidney stones, and broken bones.

When people use narcotics exclusively to control pain, it is unlikely that they become addicted or dependent on them. A patient is given a dosage of opioids strong enough to reduce their awareness of pain but not normally potent enough to produce a euphoric state.  

The difference between dependence and addiction

Adequate pain control is the goal for the medical use of narcotics. Thus, patients or health care professionals should not allow fear of addiction to interfere with using narcotics for effective pain relief. Differentiating dependence from addiction is important.

• People receiving maintenance opioid therapy for extended periods of time may require increased doses to alleviate their pain. They may develop tolerance to the drug and experience withdrawal symptoms if the medication is abruptly stopped (this is dependence).

• Addiction is elevated narcotic abuse that becomes compulsive and self-destructive, especially concerning an opioid user's need to obtain the drug for non –pain-relief purposes.

• If circumstances allow, the dose for people using narcotics over an extended period of time for medical purposes is slowly lowered over a few weeks to prevent withdrawal symptoms. People who are weaned off narcotics and are pain free rarely return to or become abusers of narcotics. Narcotics used for short-term medical conditions rarely require weaning since stopping the medication after a brief period rarely produces adverse effects.