Heroin Addiction Treatment Center

Heroin addiction frequently arises out of a struggle with prescription drugs. Each year, thousands of prescriptions for opioid pain medications are written by medical providers to help individuals struggling with a range of chronic pain conditions. Unfortunately, dependency and addiction to opioid pain medications is a widespread struggle across the nation. As federal, state, and local agencies struggle to find safer and effective ways to manage the opioid epidemic, medical providers have drastically reduced prescribing of opioid medications. 

This has led people who struggle with an addiction to opioids to seek alternate substances. Heroin is often a substance of choice, as it is easier to obtain than many opioid drugs. Heroin is also highly addictive, and the process of overcoming an addiction to heroin can be dangerous if attempted without help from a heroin addiction rehab. 

Heroin is a manufactured drug. It is created by processing the seeds of the opium poppy, a plant native to several countries in Mexico, Asia, and South America. Heroin is derived from morphine which occurs naturally in the opium poppy plant. Heroin can be produced in various ways. Each form leads to a different variation in the appearance of the drug. Heroin may be a brown or white-colored powder. Heroin may also be a sticky, black substance called black tar heroin. Heroin also goes by several “street names,” like hell dust and smack. 

Heroin can be introduced to the body in several ways, making it easier to use than some other illicit substances. Depending on how it is produced, it can be snorted, smoked, or mixed with liquid and injected directly into the veins. Heroin can also be combined with cocaine to form a far more potent substance. This process is known as speedballing and can significantly increase your risk of overdose and overdose-related death. 

When you use heroin, regardless of the mode of use, the time between using and feeling the effects of the drug is very short. However, certain methods of use produce effects quicker, sometimes within a matter of seconds. When heroin enters the brain, it binds to specific locations (receptor sites) on the brain and associated nerves called opioid receptors. These locations are the same areas of the brain prescription opioids (pain killers) used to help slow or temporarily stop the flow of pain messages from the brain to other areas of the body. These receptor sites are also linked to several vital body functions, including heart rate, breathing, and sleeping patterns. 

As previously mentioned, research has suggested that prescription opioids may act as gateway drugs to heroin. Both prescription opioids and heroin produce similar effects making heroin an adequate substitute for someone who can no longer access prescription opioids. Also, recent statistical data indicates a percentage of people who formerly struggled with prescription opioid abuse switched to heroin when they could no longer get their drug of choice either because their prescription ran out or they could not “find” it through other means.