Addiction: An Information Guide is the latest in the series of CAMH guides for clients and families. Written by professional counsellors, this concise and easy-to-read booklet includes information on: - what addiction is - what causes addiction - addiction treatment and other support options - recovery and relapse prevention - help for partners and families - explaining addiction to children. The guide also recommends books and websites where people can learn more, and includes contact information for organizations and services that can offer support. Professionals may wish to offer this guide to their clients and families and use it to introduce and discuss issues. People with substance use problems and their families may wish to order this guide for themselves. The guide is also useful for health and social service workers, students, journalists and anyone else wanting to gain a basic understanding of addiction, its effects and treatment.

Ice. Methedrine. Crank. Crystal. Whatever its guise, the social and political contexts of methamphetamine share a certain uniqueness. Nicholas Parsons chronicles the history and mythology of methamphetamine in the United States from the 1940s¿when it was hailed as a wonder drug¿to the present. In an intriguing analysis, he also makes an important contribution to our understanding of the social construction of social problems.

These guidelines have been developed to enable professionals to assist women who are pregnant, or have recently had a child, and who use alcohol or drugs or who have a substance use disorder, to achieve healthy outcomes for themselves and their fetus or infant. They have been developed in response to requests from organizations, institutions and individuals for technical guidance on the identification and management of alcohol, and other substance use and substance use disorders in pregnant women. They were developed in tandem with the WHO recommendations for the prevention and management of tobacco use and second-hand smoke exposure in pregnancy.

The growth in the use of amphetamine-type stimulants (ATS) has become a significant global problem over the last 10-15 years, often involving new and unfamiliar ATS and trafficking trends which present a challenge to both national law enforcement authorities and to scientists in drug testing forensic laboratories. Given the need for more accurate methods for identification and analysis, this manual reflects the discussions and conclusions of a UNODC Consultative Meeting held in London in September 1998.

Provides facts young people need to make informed decisions about crystal meth and other amphetamines.

A New York Times bestseller, Norman Ohler's Blitzed is a "fascinating, engrossing, often dark history of drug use in the Third Reich” (Washington Post). The Nazi regime preached an ideology of physical, mental, and moral purity. Yet as Norman Ohler reveals in this gripping history, the Third Reich was saturated with drugs: cocaine, opiates, and, most of all, methamphetamines, which were consumed by everyone from factory workers to housewives to German soldiers. In fact, troops were encouraged, and in some cases ordered, to take rations of a form of crystal meth—the elevated energy and feelings of invincibility associated with the high even help to account for the breakneck invasion that sealed the fall of France in 1940, as well as other German military victories. Hitler himself became increasingly dependent on injections of a cocktail of drugs—ultimately including Eukodal, a cousin of heroin—administered by his personal doctor. Thoroughly researched and rivetingly readable, Blitzed throws light on a history that, until now, has remained in the shadows. “Delightfully nuts.”—The New Yorker

Stimulant drugs are widely used in the treatment of ADHD in children and adults. Hundreds of studies over the past 60 years have demonstrated their effectiveness in improving attention span, increasing impulse control, and reducing hyperactivity and restlessness. Despite widespread interest in these compounds, however, their mechanisms of action in the central nervous system have remained poorly understood. Recent advances in the basic and clinical neurosciences now afford the possibility of elucidating these mechanisms. The current volume is the first to bring this expanding knowledge to bear on the central question of why and how stimulants exert their therapeutic effects. The result is a careful, comprehensive, and insightful integration of material by well-known scientists that significantly advances our understanding of stimulant effects and charts a course for future research. Part I presents a comprehensive description of the clinical features of ADHD and the clinical response to stimulants. Part II details the cortical and subcortical neuroanatomy and functional neurophysiology of dopamine and norepinephrine systems with respect to the regulation of attention, arousal, activity, and impulse control and the effects of stimulants on these systems. Part III is devoted to clinical research, including recent studies of neuroimaging, genetics, pharmacodynamic and pharmacokinetic properties of stimulants, effects on cognitive functions, neurophysiological effects in humans with and without ADHD and in non-human primates, and comparison of stimulants and non-stimulants in the treatment of ADHD. Part IV is a masterful synthesis that presents alternative models of stimulant drug action and generates key hypotheses for continued research. The volume will be of keen interest to researchers and clinicians in psychiatry, psychology, and neurology, neuroscientists studying stimulants, and those pursuing development of new drugs to treat ADHD.