1. OTC and Prescription Drug Abuse Slideshow Pictures
2. Health Risks of Alcohol Abuse Slideshow Pictures

Medical Author:

Roxanne Dryden-Edwards, MD

Roxanne Dryden-Edwards, MD

Dr. Roxanne Dryden-Edwards is an adult, child, and adolescent psychiatrist. She is a former Chair of the Committee on Developmental Disabilities for the American Psychiatric Association, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland, and Medical Director of the National Center for Children and Families in Bethesda, Maryland.

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Medical Editor:

Melissa Conrad Stöppler, MD, Chief Medical Editor

Melissa Conrad Stöppler, MD, Chief Medical Editor

Melissa Conrad Stöppler, MD, is a U.S. board-certified Anatomic Pathologist with subspecialty training in the fields of Experimental and Molecular Pathology. Dr. Stöppler's educational background includes a BA with Highest Distinction from the University of Virginia and an MD from the University of North Carolina. She completed residency training in Anatomic Pathology at Georgetown University followed by subspecialty fellowship training in molecular diagnostics and experimental pathology.

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If you have a psychiatrist who knows of your drug use, and if your symptoms are psychiatric in nature (such as mania, paranoia, violence, suicidal thoughts, major depression, homicidal thoughts, or hallucinations), call or have someone call your doctor.

• Call your doctor if the following conditions develop:
• If you have foul, itchy, or bloody discharge, or facial pain that seems like sinusitis
• If your chronic cough is associated with a mild fever, more phlegm production, or foul phlegm
• If you are pregnant and have premature labor pain, vaginal bleeding, or ankle swelling with high blood pressure
• If you notice redness with mild swelling and mild pain at an injection site

Severe headache, generalized seizures, chest pain, loss of consciousness, signs of a stroke (loss of vision, seeing double, inability to speak or slurred speech, weakness of extremities), or coma are all symptoms that demand emergency care. Call 911 for an ambulance as opposed to bringing someone by car to a hospital emergency department.

Someone with severe depression, violent behavior, paranoia, suicidal, or homicidal behavior should certainly be brought to the hospital, especially if a psychiatrist is not easily reached. Police may be needed to subdue the violent, paranoid, suicidal, or homicidal person.

• Go to an emergency department if the following conditions develop:
• A brisk nosebleed that cannot be stopped by direct pressure for 10 minutes
• Facial pain or headache with a fever
• Severe chest pain, difficulty breathing, shortness of breath, or foul or bloody phlegm with fever
• High blood pressure, especially with symptoms of headache, chest pain, or shortness of breath
• Chest pain, usually described as pressure or squeezing in nature, which may be accompanied by difficulty breathing, nausea, vomiting, and sweatiness
• Vaginal bleeding, premature labor pains, and suspicion of miscarriage
• Significant swelling, pain, redness, red lines leading from the injection site, and accompanied by fever
• Severe abdominal pain, persistent vomiting, vomiting blood
• If you think that one of your packets you have swallowed or stuffed in a body orifice (vagina, rectum) is leaking or has broken

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