The Drug Pandemic

Kent I Phillips MS MSAC APA

Description

“Working with Kent Philips in a clinical setting, he has a full and valuable understanding of the addiction world. This treatise examines multiple aspects and failures in terms of addressing the opioid and drug crisis in the U.S. He takes us on a journey through foundations and expansions of drug availability in our communities, government failures in halting, shortcomings of our prevention programs, and the weakness of treatment protocols and therapeutics. This work is a must-read for anyone with an interest or involvement in addiction”
- Bonnie Dendooven
Author of Mawasi Index, trainer at international institute of trauma and addiction professionals.
“Mr. Kent Phillips masterfully provides an insightful and comprehensive overview of the current state of opioid crisis and the overall changes in the American addiction treatment system. Drawing from his successful business executive experience and personal recovery journey, he engages the reader in trying to find better and more efficient solutions to the deadly disease of addiction. Brilliant and thrilling, a must read!
- Dr. Elena Volfson
Addiction psychiatrist, assistant professor of psychiatry, Mayo Clinic Medical School

Sujets

• Substance Abuse
• Self-help
• Addictions

Informations

• Publié par: Xlibris US
• Date de parution: 24 novembre 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781669843634
• Langue: English

Extrait

THE DRUG PANDEMIC


An American Tragedy






An Introduction to Harmonic Dualism
Kent I Phillips, MS, MSAC, APA,



Copyright © 2022 by Kent I Phillips, MS, MSAC, APA,.

ISBN:
Softcover
978-1-6698-4362-7
eBook
978-1-6698-4363-4

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.
Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.





Rev. date: 11/22/2022





Xlibris
844-714-8691
www.Xlibris.com
845263



CONTENTS
Preface
Introduction
Chapter 1: Research Void
Chapter 2: Why Are There Addicts?
Chapter 3: Family Dynamics: The Evolution Of The American Family
Family Dynamics
Chapter 4: Substance Nation
Chapter 5: Warning Signs: Discovery And Confrontation
Warning Signs Of Addiction
The Confrontation
Chapter 6: Enabling Or Tough Love
Chapter 7: Journey To Addiction
A Fountain Of Stimuli
Cell Phones
Sugar And Caffeine
Chapter 8: Government Failures
Prison
Chapter 9: Generation Or Genetics?
The Addiction “Gene”
Chapter 10: The Fuel Of Addiction: Defiance, Boredom, And Anger
Defiance
Boredom
Anger And Anxiety
Chapter 11: Paths And Obstacles To Change
Clinical Scope
Logic
Psychological Testing
Comorbidities
Chapter 12: Medically Assisted Treatment
Suboxone
Naltrexone
Vivitrol
Chapter 13: Harmonic Dualism
Two People
Harmonic Dualism And Group Therapy
The Group Recovery System
Group Therapy Classrooms
Clinical Harmonic Dualism
Aftercare



PREFACE
In the following pages, much of what I say about the treatment industry may strike many counselors and treatment professionals as unfair. But what is truly unfair is that the addiction facilities are billing Insurance companies billions of dollars to continue with what they call “evidence-based” treatment, although few are clear on what this means. What “evidence-based” seems to mean is that a treatment protocol has been used over and over by many professionals all over the country and has been approved by industry leaders. So “evidence-based” might best be replaced by the term “results-based.”
The problem began when we started classifying young drug addicts as experiencing “addiction” in the same way that an alcoholic does, and then using the old treatments developed for alcoholics for the hard drug addict (HDA). I can assure you that a patient addicted to alcohol does not resemble a teenage heroin or methamphetamine addict in any way. Yes, they may be suffering from general addiction, but each group requires different treatment and result-based protocols. It’s like expecting the same treatment to cure all cancer patients, regardless of what kind of cancer a patient has.
This book is a warning. During these times when we have feared contracting a virus, our attention has drifted away from the most important public health challenge to America. The Centers for Disease Control published figures recently charting 100,000 opioid overdose deaths in 2021. This number is expected to grow by 20 percent each year . Opioids and other deadly drugs are for sale in your schools, in your towns, and your neighborhoods. Giant organizations, mainly from Mexico, target suburbs and small towns because that is where kids have money. The most lethal drugs of late are Percocet pills laced with unknown amounts of fentanyl.
Unless you have experienced the overdose death of a friend or relative, you may not have an emotional response to many of the following chapters. But the image most Americans have of opioid addicts as someone sleeping in the gutter downtown is inaccurate. We are losing some of the best and brightest of our youth at a faster rate than in World War Two.
Many in the treatment industry will criticize my conclusions and observations. Remember, however, that the underlying reason for this book and my conclusions is that our addiction treatment system in America is not working .
Drug relapse rates following treatment are above 80 percent, although no reliable statistics truly exist. What we do know is that drug addiction and deaths from drugs are everywhere. We used to envision drug use as an urban phenomenon; today, it is also a suburban phenomenon. We all hear of someone’s son or daughter dying from a drug overdose. Note that when 100,000 deaths by overdose occur, 100,000 families are emotionally destroyed as well.
This book will isolate every step of addiction development, incarceration, treatment protocols, and long-term recovery. Please accept this work with the realization that no one truly has an answer to the drug problem. My comments and suggestions are just that: alternative ways to approach what we do in jurisprudence, treatment, and aftercare that might help. At the very least, this work will challenge our current processes. In fact, I hope to challenge the entire drug enforcement system, assessments, treatment, and aftercare.
My experience in the treatment of addiction began in 1988, when I entered a treatment support group. However, I must recognize the three most important experts whose thoughts and insights inform my approach in this book. I consider Bonnie Dendooven to be America’s Master of Counseling, the top therapist in the nation. I would like to thank the brilliant Dr. Elena Volfson for her help and mentorship. Dr. Volfson, who trained at the Pavlov Institute in St. Petersburg and the Mayo Clinic, always zeroes in on the patient’s issues. Acknowledgment also goes to Anne Fletcher, author of Inside Rehab , who first looked at the treatment industry and observed its faults and opportunities. And a final salute to Randy Dannheim of Crossroads Recovery in Phoenix, who remains a friend and supporter.



INTRODUCTION
The US Centers for Disease Control recently stated over 100,000 opioid overdose deaths were reported in the last twelve months. At the current rate, drug overdose will have killed as many youth under thirty in thirty-six months as we lost in all of World War Two! Overdose is killing some of our best and brightest, and death tolls are rising rapidly. Who is to blame?
To start, our government—including the FBI, DEA, ICE, and a million local law enforcement police—have failed to protect us. No American was ever supposed to have access to street drugs such as methamphetamine, cocaine, and opioids or to synthetics like fentanyl. The government has failed to protect us.
Drugs are available in just about every city in America, and addicts exist everywhere. Drug dealers realized in the first decade of this century that the real money is not in the inner city but the suburbs and small towns. Owing to universal distribution by illicit organizations bigger than Upjohn or Eli Lilly, kids in their early teens often sample one of these drugs and begin to use it regularly until they are addicted. And the assumption that only stupid people would ever use drugs is false . The average addict is highly intelligent and possesses a high Intelligence Quotient (IQ).
Americans’ first instinct when they discover that a loved one has a problem is to “send them to treatment.” Around the year 2007, addiction treatment centers began to receive a flood of young drug patients. However, the centers were equipped only with antiquated protocols developed in the 1950s and 1960s to treat alcoholics. The treatment world decided drug addicts and alcohol addicts belonged to a single group of afflictions called “addiction.” Now they treat drug addicts with the same protocols as alcoholics and consider them all to have this disease of “addiction.”
While this is convenient from a profit standpoint, to consider alcoholism and heroin addiction as the same disease is ridiculous. Throughout this book, and particularly in chapters 2 and 11, we will return to this topic to understand why these types of addictions are unalike and require their own unique treatments.
This book is titled The Drug Pandemic because the problem is worldwide. Here in America we have failed to protect ourselves, and the treatment methods in place to help us have failed. Currently, the relapse rate for hard drug addicts under thirty is about 80 percent in the first month following treatment. Why do Americans seem so indifferent to the loss of our youth? Why have we not conducted the research necessary to develop treatment protocols that work for hard drug addicts, and why have we allowed our national drug programs to fail? Of special note is the fact that no treatment centers are dedicated to African Americans in the US . This book is my plea for evaluating, testing, and replacing what the industry refers to as “evidence-based” treatment with real solutions to the drug crisis.
Here are major themes I will discuss in detail in this book.
• Addicts have higher than normal intelligence levels.
• Addicts were bored in school and classrooms.
• Treatment centers misdiagnose or overdiagnose.
• Comorbidities cannot be treated properly within a thirty-, sixty-, or ninety-day stay at a treatment center.
• Hard drug addicts cannot be successfully treated with alcoholic protocols.
• Addicts will seldom respond to logic such as “drugs are bad.”
• D