Psychoactive drugs stimulants

Stimulation of appetite and weight gain has frequently been observed as a side effect of long-term therapy with various psychoactive drugs. Prominent examples not... 

Psychoactive drugs can influence neurotransmission at its five different stages (Chapter 2). First, they may modify the biosynthesis of a neurotransmitter. Second, they can increase or decrease their storage within the presynaptic neuron. Third, they may stimulate or inhibit neurotransmitter release from the synaptic bouton. Fourth, they may affect the binding of the neurotransmitters to its receptor. Finally, they can retard the neurotransmitter s inactivation. Some examples of each of these stages will be given below, but it should be noted that many drugs affect several of these processes. 

Kalix P. (1994). Khat, an amphetamine-like stimulant. Psychoactive Drugs. 26(1) 69-74. 

Sny drug affecting the mind or behavior is classified as psychoactive. In this section we focus on three classes of psychoacrive drugs stimulants, hallucinogens, and depressants. 

Cannabinoids Hashish Marijuana Psychoactive drugs with mixed (stimulant and depressant] activity Smoked possible oral ingestion Initial response euphoria, excitement, increased perception later response relaxation, stupor, dreamlike state Endocrine changes (decreased testosterone in males] and changes in respiratory function similar to chronic ... 

For thousands of years, cannabis has enjoyed historical significance as a recreational drug, a useful fiber, an oil, an edible seed, and a medicine. It has been used to aid religious practices, alter mood (psychoactive effect), stimulate creativity, treat disease, relieve anxiety and boredom, enhance sensory experience and pleasure, rebel against authority, and go along with peer influence. That is a lot of work for one plant to do. This probably explains why cannabis has always been an important cultivated crop and is currently a cornerstone of controversial debate in all sectors of U.S. and international society. 

Psychoactive drugs, including psychiatric drugs, vary in their toxicity. However, all of the major categories of psychiatric drugs—antidepressants, stimulants, tranquilizers (antianxiety drugs), mood stabilizers, and anti-psychotics—are neurotoxic. They poison neurons, and sometimes destroy them. 

Fourth, as an expert in criminal and civil cases, I have studied the lives of many individuals who—under the influence of psychoactive drugs such as SSRIs, nonselective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (NSRIs), and benzodiazepines—have committed acts of aggression that were wholly alien to their character and antithetical to their prior behavior. It is, of course, well known that the illegal use of stimulant drugs, such as meth-amphetamine and cocaine, can be associated with paranoid reactions and violence. 

Most psychoactive drugs come from plants, and there are hundreds of plants with psychoactive properties. People have put most of them to use in one part of the world or another at one time or another. Often drug plants taste bad, are weak, or have unwanted side effects. Traditional peoples who use these plants, such as Native Americans, have come up with clever ways of preparing and ingesting them to maximize the desired effects or make them easier to take. Traditional peoples do not tamper with the chemical composition of the plants, however. For example, South American Indians have found that drying coca leaves and mixing them with ashes or other alkalis increases their stimulant effect. They have also learned to make a powerful snuff from the resin of the virola tree (a DMT-containing plant) in order to take... 

Alcohol is the most popular psychoactive drug in the world, used every day by many millions of people. Probably, it is also the oldest drug known to human beings, because it is easy to discover that fruits and juices, left to stand in a warm place, soon ferment into alcoholic mixtures. Alcohol is so commonplace and its effects, both good and bad, are so well known that they need little description. Anyone who has felt the pleasant stimulation of a glass of wine knows the beneficial side of this drug. Anyone who has interacted with a drunk person knows how powerful and unpleasant alcohol can be in overdose. Anyone who has lived with an alcoholic can attest to the horrors of alcohol addiction. 

OTC cough syrups Lire ot varied compositicwi. Some eontain no obviously psychoactive drugs Others contain known depressants, such as alcohol and chloroform stimulants such as phenylpropanolamine antihistamineSj and derivatives oi opiates considered to he non narco tie. Sometimes people who are desperate for drugs and who cannot get anything better consume overdoses of these preparations in efforts to get high. 

Down 1) No longer under the effect of a psychoactive drug, especially a stimulant or hallucinogen, as in, "If you take acid now, you... 

Another neurotransmitter system, that is a potential target for psychoactive drugs detected in the environment, is GABA, which is one of the most abundant neurotransmitters in the vertebrate central nervous system and is considered the main inhibitory neurotransmitter. Injections of GABA rapidly increased GTH-II release in goldfish by stimulation of GnRH release and inhibition of the inhibitory DA system66. 

Caffeine Caffeine, a mild stimulant, is the most widely used psychoactive drug in the world. It is present in soft drinks, coffee, tea, cocoa, chocolate, and numerous prescription and over-the-counter drugs. It mildly increases NE and DA release and enhances neural activity in numerous brain areas. Caffeine is absorbed from the digestive tract and is distributed rapidly throughout all tissues and easily crosses the placental barrier see Chapter 27). Many of caffeine s effects are beheved to occur by means of competitive antagonism at adenosine receptors. Adenosine is a neuromodulator that influences a number of functions in the CNS see Chapters 12 and 27). The mild sedating effects that occur when adenosine activates particrrlar adenosine-receptor subtypes can be antagonized by caffeine. 

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