CADCA

CADCA’s partner, the Consumer Healthcare Products Association (CHPA) and its StopMedicineAbuse.org campaign will host a forum called “Inside the Teen Brain: Is there an app for that?” at 9:30 a.m. EST Sept. 29 to kick off October’s National Medicine Abuse Awareness Month (#NMAAM). The live webcast is open to the public.

Kareemah Abdullah, CADCA’s Director of the National Community Anti-Drug Coalition Institute & Vice President of Training Operations, will be one of the guest speakers.

Adolescents who live in rural areas and small towns and cities are more likely to abuse prescription painkillers than adolescents who live in large urban areas, according to sociologists in a study reported in Medical News Today.

Teens in rural communities are 35 percent more likely to have abused prescription painkillers in the past year than adolescents living in large cities. Adolescents who live in small cities have a 21 percent greater likelihood of abusing prescription painkillers than their large urban counterparts.

Did you know that one in 25 youth ages 12 through 17 has abused cough medicine to get high from its dextromethorphan ingredient, and one in 5 young adults has abused a prescription drug? Help raise awareness of the dangers of prescription (Rx) drug abuse and over-the-counter (OTC) cough medicine abuse during National Medicine Abuse Awareness Month in October, and take part in the CADCA 50 Challenge.

Senators Joe Manchin (D-W.V.), Tim Kaine (D-Va.) and Mark Warner (D-Va.) sent a letter to the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Ranking Member Patty Murray (D-Wash.) calling for an investigation into the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) decision to approve OxyContin for use by children as young as 11-years-old and an examination of the rise in the opioid misuse, abuse and consequent overdose deaths.

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) invites providers, patients, and organization representatives to provide input on Draft CDC Opioid Prescribing Guidelines for Chronic Pain during a webinar presentation and discussion from 2:30-4 p.m. EST Sept. 16.

Most coalitions would want their work to “on the map,” so to speak, but one coalition in the state where CADCA and its coalitions just convened our annual Mid-Year Training Institute has implemented CADCA strategies to get its name “off” a map, literally.

The Drug Enforcement Administration announced that the 10th National Prescription Drug Take-Back will take place September 26th from 10 a.m.-2 p.m.

As with the previous nine Take-Back events, sites will be set up throughout communities nationwide so local residents can return their unwanted, unneeded, or expired prescription drugs for safe disposal.

The Drug Enforcement Administration Acting Administrator Chuck Rosenberg Tuesday announced that the 10th National Prescription Drug Take-Back will take place September 26th from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. As with the previous nine Take-Back events, sites will be set up throughout communities nationwide so local residents can return their unwanted, unneeded, or expired prescription drugs for safe disposal.

Congressman and medical doctor Larry Bucshon (R-Ind.) and Congressman Steve Womack (R-Ark.) this week introduced H.R. 2872, the Opioid Addiction Treatment Modernization Act, a bill to help combat the opioid abuse epidemic and ensure patients have access to appropriate treatments. 

Mayo Clinic researchers have found that one in four people who were taking prescription painkillers for the first time progressed to long-term prescriptions.

The study, “Incidence and Risk Factors for Progression From Short-term to Episodic or Long-term Opioid Prescribing,” also found that people with histories of tobacco use and substance abuse were likeliest to use opioid painkillers long-term.