MHA Society for Behavioral Health

Study: Hospital stays for overdoses rise among young adults

U.S. hospital stays for overdoses involving both alcohol and drugs rose by 76% among young adults between 1999 and 2008, to 29,202, according to a new study by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. For adults under age 25, hospital stays for drug overdoses rose 56% over the 10-year period to 113,907, while stays for alcohol overdoses rose 25% to 29,412. The authors call for stronger efforts to educate medical practitioners and the general public about the dangers of excessive alcohol consumption alone or in combination with other drugs.

The study appears in this month’s Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs.

The Coming Transformation Of Public Addiction Treatment

Provisions of the Affordable Care Act and other recent legislative changes will transform public substance abuse treatment in the United States, substantially increasing the funding, expanding access to care, and better integrating it with other health services. That’s the conclusion of an article by Jeffrey Buck, senior advisor for behavioral health in the Center for Strategic Planning, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, in the August 2011 issue of Health Affairs.