Performance Enhancing Drugs Book

Why do patients overlook the risks to use performance enhancing drugs? Patients with the goal to enhance physical or mental performance find it increasingly easier to obtain drugs on their own without a physician's help--thus paving the path to medical consequences from irregular heart beats to addiction to death. Performance Enhancing Medications and Drugs of Abuse explores various medications currently being abused by patients, from the drugs used for physical and cosmetic purposes by weekend warriors, professional athletes, and other at-risk populations, to the drugs used to enhance mood and memory. This invaluable source explains the risks, adverse consequences, and options available to inhibit the spread of performance enhancing drug abuse into our society. Often when a physician learns of a patient's drug abuse, it is viewed as being related to an illicit drug or rationalized as self-medication or primary psychiatric problem, such as its use as a sleep aid, a mood enhancer, or to lose weight. Performance Enhancing Medications and Drugs of Abuse explains the reasons why patients take friend's prescriptions and other drugs all the while overlooking the risks of using drugs to enhance performance. This book provides the information professionals need to knowledgeably approach prescription drug abuse and related problems. This source gives the background, development, and proper professional use of each drug choice along with the perceived performance improvement a patient may be seeking through inappropriate use. Risks and effects are discussed in detail along with the reasons the drug's use has not abated during the 'war on drugs.' The book is extensively referenced and includes helpful figures and tables to clearly illustrate information. Drugs discussed in detail in Performance Enhancing Medications and Drugs of Abuse include: Anabolic steroids Caffeine Nicotine MDMA (ecstacy) Erectile dysfunction medications Performance Enhancing Medications and Drugs of Abuse is an ideal resource for physicians,researchers, clinical experts, professors, psychiatrists, and therapists specializing in addictions, addictions treatment, and substance abuse.Read More