<p>Central NJ here. Heroin has been aproblem for years.</p>
<p>I haven’t heard about kids using heroin in my suburb, but maybe I’m just not “in the know.” </p>
<p>How do people use it? Is it smoked or injected? Is it more expensive than other drugs? What are the signs of drug use?</p>
<p>Ugh. Another thing to worry about…</p>
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<p>Just heard a similar story on the radio. It appears that the rise of heroin can be traced to the very effective way the use of prescribed drugs has diminished. A few years ago, the White House decreed the use of painkillers an epidemic. Apparently, the people who obtain refills are subject to audits and are tracked. As a result, the black market for one pill of Vicodin or Percocet is around 80 dollars. </p>
<p>As a result, heroin is a lot cheaper and easier to get.</p>
<p>It was big here in the 90’s. Now days, it is more ecstasy here…but crack and heroin are still issues.</p>
<p>Well, coming from a suburban girl from Connecticut, I’ve never heard of anyone using heroin here. Pot, ecstasy, prescription drugs, and shrooms, yes. Heroin? Never heard of any talk of use around my area. I’m friends with a lot of people in different towns around here, so I would’ve heard about it by now. We all like to gossip amongst eachother a lot. So, I wouldn’t say it’s prevalent everywhere. The majority of kids around here smoke pot.</p>
<p>Considering that so many people OD on prescription pills, and Oxy is a huge problem in the country, I have no problem with a crackdown by this or any administration. But of course that is ignored by the media since it is often a working class drug problem. Heroin has been around for years in Berkeley (it never really went away as a street drug for many) but since moving back to the Midwest, what I see here are Oxy and Vicodin addicts. Next we have meth addicts. We did have a heroin bust a few weeks ago in a neighboring town that involved middle-class young adults as dealers so the local media has picked up interest. If they were poor kids it wouldn’t have made the local news.</p>
<p>“How do people use it? Is it smoked or injected? Is it more expensive than other drugs? What are the signs of drug use?”</p>
<p>White China heroin (most of which comes from Afghanistan) can be snorted; black tar very rarely. However, it is rare for a snorter not to be injecting within a month. It is incredibly cheap ($8-$15 where I live; OyxContin was $80, but now the supply of OxyContin from Canada where the time release properties were easy to break, has now slowed, so is much less available). </p>
<p>Among high school kids where we’ve been able to survey, the lead source of prescription-type opiates is unused dental prescriptions. Dentists tend to overprescribe as they have no “overnight call”. Second is docs. Among 8th graders (where we find opiate drug use tends to start), we see a significant overlap between the opiates and abuse of the psychostimulants (Ritalin, etc.) Makes no sense, it would seem. But we also see meth making a comeback, and meth users will often use heroin as a way to “smooth the way down”.</p>
<p>“Well, coming from a suburban girl from Connecticut, I’ve never heard of anyone using heroin here.”</p>
<p>There’s A LOT of heroin in the suburbs in Connecticut. A CDC study from three years ago found that fully 4% of Connecticut high school seniors had used heroin (nationally, the percentage was 2.5%).</p>
<p>^In response to that, I’d just like to say that when we had to take the survey for that this past year, almost everyone I knew put down that they had tried every drug, performed every sexual act, and drank every type of drink there is out there. I’m not supporting the use of any of this crap, I’m just saying that the statistics aren’t always correct, especially since most of us are just screwing around with the answers anyways.</p>
<p>Also, you kind of took what I said out of context. I went on to explain “here” in what I said farther down. “Here” meaning my area. In case you were confused, I meant my area, central Connecticut, near Southington and Farmington, not ALL of Connecticut. Obviously, there are users and people who have tried it. That doesn’t mean that they’ve continued on with heroin.</p>
<p>We know how very well, with 40 years of experience, to deal with false answers on student surveys. We really do. The methodology has been well-tested. (I could send you literally dozens of papers on how CDC survey data is validated, but you wouldn’t believe it anyway. ;))</p>
<p>Haven’t heard of it here. But my sis has some in-laws who are heroin addicts.
Sad–couple giving 2nd kid up for adoption–for the $.</p>
<p>D is doing an internship with a dentist in suburban area–regularly see drug seekers. Easy to spot/track from one office/pharmacy to another. A few years back, D’s teammate OD’d on prescription drugs.</p>
<p>No, mini, I simply don’t care enough about whatever statistics are out there that the CDC has collected, or whatever any company has come up with. Kids are still going to do whatever drugs they please based on the availability of them. All I was saying was that around where I live there isn’t any decent amount of usage, to the point where it’s being abused by every kid who takes drugs.</p>
<p>As others have noted, but this is actually the most important point here, and the ONLY thing anyone on this thread can do to stop this phenomenon: THE KIDS GET THE PRESCRIPTION OPIATES FROM THEIR PARENT’S MEDICINE CABINETS OR IRRESPONSIBLE DOC AND DENTIST PRESCRIPTIONS. So… if you think, 'oh, I’ll just keep that vicodin around even though I don’t need it for whatever my doc overprescibed it for," think again and toss it immediately. If a doctor ever prescribes an oxy anything to your child, hand the prescription back and ask for something less intense. Oxycodones are as addictive as heroin and should only be used in end of life pain management situations, imho. Don’t voluntarily give your kid anything like that. Hang onto the drug yourself and dole it out. If he/she seems better, at all, try them asap on a nonsteroidal pain killer, immediately and as soon as you are certain they are managing with slight pain on the nonsteroidal, TOSS the leftover medication. </p>
<p>There is research to indicate: 1. Opiates are less effective pain relievers for women than for men. 2. Prescription nonsteroidals are more effective at managing pain than opiates, which only mask. </p>
<p>after a certain amount of time, not long, on an opiate, the person will have physical withdrawal when ceasing the drug. Find out how long this takes. By that time, your kid is officially addicted. It’s fast and it’s deadly. You’re better off letting them feel a little bit of pain then letting them ruin their lives. Don’t trust your doctor to understand this or to prescribe responsibly. They don’t. They don’t to the point they are now being monitored by the DEA. Monitor them yourselves. If you or your kids are prescribed a medication, get the facts. Don’t just blindly pop the pills.</p>
<p>
Our 23 y/o nephew from suburban Connecticut was arrested in West Hartford (probably the quintessential “nice” suburban town) last year for heroin possession - so it’s certainly there. We were stunned, though we shouldn’t have been, since there were several previous alcohol and drug-related incidents. He’s been through rehab at least once - this is a terrible addiction. My d knows of a hs acquaintance, also early 20s and the product of a very good upbringing, who is struggling with this problem.</p>
<p>Not to mention that a heroin dealer was just arrested this week in the center of quaint little South Glastonbury. The article in the Hartford Courant just says a restaurant parking lot on Main Street – and then gives the actual street number which is practically next to the South Glastonbury Firehouse. Glastonbury is right there with West Hartford and Simsbury and Farmington as being one of those “quintessential nice town” …</p>
<p>We have an entire Emergency Department here (Swedish Hospital) that has gone entirely Schedule II free! They found NO need for OxyContin, etc. in the ER that couldn’t be better met by other drugs. (Most of the time, it is simply Tylenol.)</p>
<p>That’s interesting mini,but personally when I am in pain usually need something stronger thanTylenol.</p>
<p>When I had a concussion, Swedish gave me hydrocodone and Vicodin, as well as something else. I only took the extra hydrocodone when I was resting & I didn’t drive. The pills plus the concussion made me pretty spacey. Noticeably more than usual! ;)</p>
<p>As a redhead I have an altered pain response. When undergoing general anesthesia they have had to give me more for my height and body weight to keMep me under, resulting in pretty bad side affects the next day.
I would think this would also make it more likely to get addicted to something, but the opposite has been true. I don’t take pain meds unless it is really interfereing with my life & of course then it takes more to make a difference.</p>
<p>I can’t say I have heard about heroin use in this area, of course I used to live with a man who injected it, and I seriously didn’t know.
This article says that some is very pure plus it has something else mixed in it.</p>
<p>What scares me more than heroin though is crack.
[New</a>, Deadly Heroin Mix Kills Dozen-Plus in NW - News Story - KTVZ Bend](<a href=“http://www.ktvz.com/news/30852113/detail.html]New”>http://www.ktvz.com/news/30852113/detail.html)
Seems much easier to get.</p>
<p>Mini and everyone else with working professional/personal knowledge on this topic:</p>
<p>What do you suggest we do when we see or have knowledge of a particular teen experimenting with heroin? Is it at all possible for a kid to only experiment and walk away, or is herion so addictive that some kind of help is needed? </p>
<p>S has a friend who told him that he had “experimented” with heroin during his first year away at college. I know this kid also used prescription opiates last summer. </p>
<p>Red flags all over this, I know. Any advice? What can a friend do? What SHOULD a friend do? What should I do, now that I have this knowledge? My son has backed far away from this friendship in the past year. I’m not worried about my own son, just unsure about what, if anything he or I should do with this knowledge.</p>
<p>(I ranted about this kid’s mom a couple of months ago on the “Say it here…” thread. Many, many issues in this family. Not sure that anything I might say would be even heard.)</p>
<p>I suppose the next time I need a root canal, some here may opt for me to take extra strength Tylenol instead of percocet/tylenol 3 for a few days to take the edge off the discomfort and allow sleep. </p>
<p>I think not. </p>
<p>The dentist writes a script for about 10 pills after a root canal. I have to call if I need more, which has only happened once.</p>
<p>Hydrocodone compounds (like Vicodin) are Schedule III. </p>
<p>We had the two batches of heavy heroin - one in Seattle, one in Cowlitz County. Because general purity levels have gone (and remain) so low, it hit folks like a ton of bricks. The local DEA lab is constantly checking for purity. (I sit on the state epidemiological workgroup that monitors this stuff.) </p>
<p>South county is a heroin hotbed. (Though the biggest problems are in the three counties north of Seattle, and Grays Harbor/Olympic Peninsula.) It is now turning up on college campuses as well. There’s not a lot of crack around (treatment admissions are at their lowest points in 15 years), though there is a meth resurgence (not to levels of seven years ago).</p>
<p>Eastcr- yes, it is possible for people to walk away from heroin. There is a strong genetic component to addiction. However, it is often the case that the movement from prescription opiates to heroin snorting to regular heroin use takes place in a short period of time. As drugs go, kicking opiate habits is a difficult thing (no difference in “success” rates between prescription-type opiates and heroin, once one controls for environmental factors and the length of time addicted). The majority of people do not succeed with simply one course of treatment (which is not surprising - if you’ve been addicted for 2-5 years, it’s not unusual that you’d have difficulty changing your life in 90 days.) Many people use suboxone (buprenorphine) as a replacement drug - we don’t have a lot of data about “success” rates, or what happens once one stops using it.</p>
<p>There are groups like nar anon, Which may be helpful for people concerned about others drug use.
I can’t speak to the addiction power of heroin personally.</p>