Alcohol is one of the substances that are most frequently abused and depended on by millions of people around the world. This is usually due to its accessibility and social permissiveness towards excessive consumption habits. Normally, the person who depends on alcohol has been drinking for many years without developing dependence and did not give greater importance to alcohol consumption until he began to abuse it; problems began at work and in the family. This is when he continued drinking until he developed some form of dependency.
The Classic Types
Two great classic types of alcohol abuse patterns are usually described: that of the continuous or daily drinker, who usually drinks wine and beer (fermentation alcohols) and does not usually show signs of intoxication (drunkenness). However, it is someone who meets the criteria for dependence or abuse (Mediterranean pattern); and that of the episodic drinker, generally younger, who consumes high-proof alcohol (distillation alcohols) in large quantities on weekends, with significant intoxications and alterations in their functioning in the first days of the week (Anglo-Saxon pattern).
Social and Medical Problems
Each of these types of abuse patterns corresponds to psychiatric social problems and even complications; different medical conditions (it is common, for example, that the drinker with the Mediterranean pattern suffers mainly from the liver and the Anglo-Saxon pattern from the pancreas). The medical problems derived from both types of consumption are important, from hepatitis or pancreatitis (inflammation) to cancer.
The Patient
The patient with a mild alcohol withdrawal syndrome presents with anxiety, morning tremors, and other symptoms that are relieved when he drinks alcohol in the morning. Delirium Tremens usually appears in severe alcohol withdrawal syndrome, which is a condition with sleep disturbance, sweating, tachycardia, hypertension, and other symptoms that reflect dysfunction of the sympathetic vegetative nervous system, visual hallucinations (mainly small animals or terrifying animals), disorientation (does not know where it is; or what day or date it is), inability to concentrate.
The Treatment
Addiction treatment is not possible if the affected person does not want to do it, and it is not easy if he is not sufficiently motivated. In the latter case, specific motivating work and commitment to the treatment of the patient and the family are usually required. Although in the most evolved cases, it is often a long and difficult road for all the benefits of the results can more than compensate for the difficulties and the efforts of the first moments.
The Two Stages
Almost all treatments usually have two stages. The first is usually called; detoxification of the substance and the priority in it is to prevent withdrawal symptoms from developing (especially in addictions to opiates, alcohol, and other substances that have a marked withdrawal syndrome). In the treatment of withdrawal syndromes, prescription drugs are sometimes used, substances that can lead to dependence (including benzodiazepines); and other problems, so it is important to follow the instructions of an expert doctor in this regard.
Conclusion
In general terms, patients should know that any psychiatric disorder almost systematically worsens with the consumption of any drug of abuse, that the use of these drugs can also cause the appearance of previously non-existent psychiatric disorders, and that the mere fact of abstaining from a Toxic previously consumed almost always causes an improvement in mood, sleep, diet, etc. Visit the website, https://www.ascendantny.com/ to learn more.