Addiction Audio

In this episode, Dr Elle Wadsworth talks to Paul Griffiths about synthetic drug production in Europe including the differences between lab-made substances and diverted medical drugs. They discuss organised crime and its impact on cocaine production, drug availability and the potential for drug contamination. They also cover fentanyl and the potential for a heroin drought resulting from changes in opium production in Afghanistan.Paul talks about the complexities of European drug markets explaining how they commonly respond to changes in both supply and demand. Elle and Paul then discuss how researchers can monitor drug trends through wastewater analysis and other methods.“These are often very small labs, but because of the potency of these drugs, it means very small production runs can have quite a big impact on local drug consumption patterns and mortality and morbidity. So we saw a few years ago, ten or fifteen years, one lab in central Europe we had a very brief outbreak of deaths in about three countries all related to a very very small, a kitchen lab it was actually in someone’s kitchen but it had an impact.”Paul Griffiths is the scientific director for the EMCDDA – the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug AddictionOriginal article: Opioid problems are changing in Europe with worrying signals that synthetic opioids may play a more significant role in the future by Paul Griffiths and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2024)The opinions expressed in this post reflect the views of the host and interviewees and do not necessarily represent the opinions or official positions of the SSA or Addiction journal.The SSA does not endorse or guarantee the accuracy of the information in external sources or links and accepts no responsibility or liability for any consequences arising from the use of such information. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Dr Merve Mollaahmetoglu talks to Dr Molly Bowdring about her recent article on the impact of alcohol-free drinks such as zero-percent beers, wines and mocktails. Molly talks about using survey data to explore different patterns, such as using non-alcoholic drinks to slow alcohol consumption, to alternate days or as part of someones recovery. Merve and Molly discuss the occasional differences between how people think non-alcoholic drinks change their alcohol consumption and what actually happens to their overall use.If you're somebody who already uses them, be reflective about how is this impacting your desire for alcohol and your consumption in that same night or across the week and just be curious about the relation between your non-alcoholic beverage use and your alcohol use.Original article: Non-alcoholic beverage consumption among US adults who consume alcohol by Molly Bowdring and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2024)The opinions expressed in this post reflect the views of the host and interviewees and do not necessarily represent the opinions or official positions of the SSA or Addiction journal.The SSA does not endorse or guarantee the accuracy of the information in external sources or links and accepts no responsibility or liability for any consequences arising from the use of such information. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Rob Calder talks to Dr Philip Newall about how the gambling industry frames the evidence on gambling advertising. Philip talks about researching the kinds of bets that are commonly advertised, explaining how they are often projected to be 'good' bets when the chances of winning are very small. "It's really got the two sides of the coin there in that it appears really attractive, but actually it's the bookmaker that's really winning the most. And that's the underlying psychology in how they're able to offer things that seem good but are actually really profitable for them."Philip also talks about how difficult it can be corralling 50 people into co-writing a short letter.Dr Philip Newall is a lecturer in psychological science at the University of Bristol, a member of the Advisory Board for Safer Gambling (although speaking on this podcast in an independent capacity) and the joint winner of the Society for the Study of Addiction’s Impact Prize in 2023.Original article: No evidence of harm’ implies no evidence of safety: Framing the lack of causal evidence in gambling advertising research by Philip Newall and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023)The opinions expressed in this post reflect the views of the host and interviewees and do not necessarily represent the opinions or official positions of the SSA or Addiction journal.The SSA does not endorse or guarantee the accuracy of the information in external sources or links and accepts no responsibility or liability for any consequences arising from the use of such information. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Zoe Swithenbank talks to Professor Robert West about his work on ontologies within addictions. Robert begins by summarising the definitions and constructions that relate to addiction, as well as their meanings and the implications for treatment. He also explains how different definitions can frustrate progress in addiction-related research.Zoe and Robert then discuss how the addictions sector can learn from other sciences - particularly the biological sciences - about how to use those definitions, labels and ontologies to aid research. Robert covers the work on AddictO Vocab (https://addictovocab.org/) and explains the goal to develop a well-defined construct for anything that anyone might want to refer to in a research paper."Ontologies are very specific ways of representing the world that have been developed primarily for use in computer science and data science.... They are very formal systems for representing things called entities. Entities are literally anything you can imagine whether it's real or not real. So 'unicorn' for example, can be an entity for example, as can 'addiction' - as can 'horse'."Original article: Achieving consensus, coherence, clarity and consistency when talking about addiction by Robert West and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023)The opinions expressed in this post reflect the views of the host and interviewees and do not necessarily represent the opinions or official positions of the SSA or Addiction journal.The SSA does not endorse or guarantee the accuracy of the information in external sources or links and accepts no responsibility or liability for any consequences arising from the use of such information. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Dr Elle Wadsworth talks to Sammie Back and Emese Kroon about nitrous oxide. The discussion happened on 8 November 2023, on the day that possession of nitrous oxide became a Class C substance in the UK. The group discuss the existing evidence for harms, addiction and other disorders, exploring this relatively under-researched area. They cover the lack of research and how researchers can begin to understand what's happening when a drug's popularity rapidly increases. They also talk about how people use nitrous oxide and in which circumstances use might be more likely. Finally, they relate nitrous oxide against criteria for substance use disorders taken from DSM-5 and discuss the implications from their findings. "We just need more data.... For a drug used this regularly, it's honestly quite astounding that we have so little scientific evidence to inform the public also healthcare professionals and policy makers." Emese KroonOriginal article: Does nitrous oxide addiction exist? An evaluation of the evidence for the presence and prevalence of substance use disorder symptoms in recreational nitrous oxide users by Sammie Back and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023) The opinions expressed in this podcast reflect the views of the host and presenters and do not necessarily represent the opinions or official positions of the SSA or Addiction journal.The SSA does not endorse or guarantee the accuracy of the information in external sources or links and accepts no responsibility or liability for any consequences arising from the use of such information. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Ben Scher talks to Professor Gerald (Jerry) Cochran about his article based on a randomized multisite pilot trial investigating the impact of Patient Navigation. Jerry begins by describing Patient Navigation, explaining how it works and how it can help people stay engaged in care. The research team explored whether this approach helps pregnant people to stay in contact with treatment services.Jerry then go on to discus the next steps for his research and explains how his research findings might be scaled up to influence policy. Jerry describes how Patient Navigation could be implemented within US Medicaid programmes summarising the data that would be needed to scale up the intervention. They then reflect on the economic implications for Medicade or state insurers."That's really exiting and it's really satisfying when you're able to identify a partner like a Medicaid programme or a large pharmacy chain.... and help them integrate into their workflow into their systems something that might help patients and think 'oh wow'. You know, not only could we help patients in a single clinic but we could help people in a state or across the country"Original article: Patient Navigation for Pregnant Persons with Opioid Use Disorder: Results of a Randomized Multisite Pilot Trial by Gerald Cochran and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023)The opinions expressed in this podcast reflect the views of the hosts and authors and do not necessarily represent the opinions or official positions of the SSA or Addiction journal.The SSA does not endorse or guarantee the accuracy of the information in external sources or links and accepts no responsibility or liability for any consequences arising from the use of such information. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Rob Calder talks to Francesco Manca about his research on Scotland's Minimum Unit Pricing (MUP) policy for alcohol, and specifically about the impact that MUP has had on road traffic accidents. Francesco discusses how the research team selected appropriate comparitors to assess whether changes to road traffic accidents could be attributed to MUP. He also talks about how this study compares with previous studies that used similar datasets yet drew different conclusions. He describes how understanding the subtle differences between time frames and outcomes can aid researchers to gain an in-depth understanding of alcohol regulation. "The original 50 pence as a floor price .... maybe too low over the years as it can be eroded by external factors such as inflation - so maybe indexing with inflation may create a more consistent effect of the policy over time"Original article: Evaluating the impact of minimum unit pricing for alcohol on road traffic accidents in Scotland after 20 months: an interrupted time series study by Francesco Manca and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023)The opinions expressed in this podcast reflect the views of the presenter and interviewee and do not necessarily represent the opinions or official positions of the SSA.The SSA does not endorse or guarantee the accuracy of the information in external sources or links and accepts no responsibility or liability for any consequences arising from the use of such information. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Zoe Swithenbank talks to Drs Amy O'Donnell and Kat Jackson about their recent study on how to improve care for people with coexisting heavy drinking and depression. The discuss the theoretical concept of Relational Autonomy and how it influenced their research. Amy and Kat describe how they set up the research, and in particular the challenges of recruiting participants from groups where your research is not their priority. They also talk about how much work it takes to conduct effective PPI (Patient and Public Involvement) and how important it is to do it well. They then go through their findings, discussing how they can inform theory and clinical practice: "A lot of people who we spoke to literally didn't have anybody. They'd been turned away from every formal health and social care service that they needed to access and they also didn't have any family relationships or friendships for various reasons. How are you supposed to get better if you don't have those?" Original article: Understanding people's experiences of the formal health and social care system for co-occurring heavy alcohol use and depression through the lens of relational autonomy: A qualitative study by Katherine Jackson and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023)The opinions expressed in this podcast reflect the views of the interviewer and interviewees and do not necessarily represent the opinions or official positions of the SSA.The SSA does not endorse or guarantee the accuracy of the information in external sources or links and accepts no responsibility or liability for any consequences arising from the use of such information. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Rob Calder talks to Zoe Swithenbank about her recent article looking at how to improve research reports on smoking cessation trials. Zoe talks about the challenges of organising an international meeting of experts before the COVID-19 pandemic (before people were used to online working). She talks about some common errors and omissions that researchers make when reporting smoking cessation trials and how these can place limits on scientific progress. She talks about developing the CONSORT-SPI tool to help improve the ability of researchers to draw conclusions across studies."It was important to get that balance and try and get a good range, and we did have quite a variety of people...different backgrounds, different expertise which made for some interesting debates."Original article: Tailoring CONSORT-SPI to improve the reporting of smoking cessation intervention trials: An expert consensus study by Zoe Swithenbank and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Ben Scher talks to Professor Laurence Lalanne about drug consumption rooms and the recent publication based on the COSINUS cohort study. They cover the range of interventions available in drug consumption rooms and how they can increase people's access to psychiatric support alongside barriers to accessing drug consumption rooms. Laurence talks about the epidemiological point of view in relation to the more biomedical aspects of drug consumption rooms, their objectives in reducing overdose and their impact on hospitals and the wider health-care system. "You need a very long follow-up....we need to follow for two years and three years to show important results about mental health and to see how they improve their well-being and access to other care."This is the second of a two-part podcast. The first, featuring Dr Marie Jauffret-Roustide, can be found here.Original article: Drug consumption rooms are effective to reduce at-risk practices associated with HIV/HCV infections among people who inject drugs: Results from the COSINUS cohort study by Laurence Lalanne and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Ben Scher talks to Dr Marie Jauffret-Roustide about drug consumption rooms and the recent publication based on the COSINUS cohort study. They cover a range of issues including the history of drug consumption rooms, the evidence on effectiveness and the challenges of studying this particular intervention.They also reflect on the social determinants of health and how drug consumption rooms can have a positive impact"We have 1% of people who attend drug consumption rooms who declared having ever shared injecting equipment in the last month before the interviews compared to 11% for people who were not exposed to drug consumption rooms"This is the first of a two-part podcast. The second, featuring Professor Laurence Lalanne can be found here.Original article: Drug consumption rooms are effective to reduce at-risk practices associated with HIV/HCV infections among people who inject drugs: Results from the COSINUS cohort study by Laurence Lalanne and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Rob Calder talks to Drs Caroline Copeland, Patrick Courtney and Paul Royall about their recent article assessing the time it would take for drones to deliver naloxone to people who are overdosing on opioids. The study team used NPSAD (National Programme on Substance Abuse Deaths) data to map out overdoses in Teeside over recent years and then to predict how long it would have taken a drone to make the journey and deliver naloxone to a bystander who would then be able to administer it. They then compared this time with the time it takes ambulances to attend the scene. Along the way they discuss take off stations, weather, traffic congestion, no-fly zones and the importance of considering whether a drone will be destroyed along the way."The initial design we came up with was a sort of cargo transport box on top of the drone, whereby the drone lands and then the bystander can remove the naloxone home kit or naloxone nasal spray from the top of that transport holder. At that point we then follow the guidance and recommendations of the at home naloxone or nasal spray." - Paul RoyallOriginal article: An evaluation of naloxone transit for opioid overdose using drones: A case study using real-world coroner data. By Caroline Copeland and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Dr Merve Mollaametoglu talks to Dr Catherine Paradis director of health promotion and scientific alcohol lead at the Canadian Centre of Substance Use and Addiction, Dr Kevin Shield from the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto and Dr Peter Butt clinical associate professor Department of Family Medicine at the University of Saskatchewan.They discuss their recent article looking at ways of making of low-risk alcohol drinking guidelines. They talk about how difficult it is to reach consensus on low-risk alcohol thresholds and how scientific evidence and public opinion meet. And the development of their ‘risk-zone’ approach. And how this can be interpreted by people who had differing perceptions of risk.They talk about why people in alcohol focused cultures appear to be willing to accept a higher rate of risk from alcohol than they do from other risk-based activities."I would liken the development of the risk-zones the risk curves allowing people to situate themselves to other scientific discoveries….A lot of other public health agencies and a lot of people who have been involved in the development of these guidelines really are taken to the utility of those risk zones and hopefully we’ll see that picked up in a lot more guidelines as well” - Dr Kevin ShieldOriginal article:  New perspectives on how to formulate alcohol drinking guidelines by Kevin Shield and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dr Elle Wadsworth talks here to Brandon Cheng about his research on social media posting and drinking behaviour. Brandon talks about the influence that media and social media have on young people and how they can influence their drinking behaviour.“A young person watching a short video of people enjoying drinks [is] likely to develop a much more vivid imagery of what drinking can be like … compared to a viewer just to see an image or text relating to someone having a good time drinking.”Original article: A systematic review and meta-analysis of the relationship between youth drinking, self-posting of alcohol use and other social media engagement (2012 – 2021) by Brandon Cheng and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Dr Rob Calder talks to Dr Thomas Hudzik about his work with the World Anti Doping Agency (WADA). Tom talks about the three principles by which a substance is assessed and how they use the latest research and policy changes to make decisions about whether a substance is banned and how it is detected. They specifically cover the decision to implement and in-competition ban cannabis and the basis on which that decision was made."The substance use can represent a risk to the athlete's health them-self or the health of those around them.... somebody who is allowed to perform in a group type of situation, their judgement will be impaired most likely. And that may affect the score that you have, but it could also mean that you do something silly physically that you might not have done otherwise because your reaction time is slow, your temporal estimation capabilities are slow." Original article: Cannabis and sport: A World Anti-Doping perspective by Thomas Hudzik and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ben Scher talks to Dr Joseph Friedman about his research on fentanyl overdoses. Joseph explains the four waves of opioid overdoses in the US and how opiate and opioid overdoses have changed.They discuss how patterns of poly-substance use are different across the US and how the combination of fentanyl and methamphetamines is become more prevalent across states. Along with the challenges of standardising results when coroners’ reports vary across the US.One of the main takeaways here is just understanding that poly-substance drug overdose is really becoming the norm….The percent of US overdose deaths involving both fentanyl and stimulants in 2010 was 0.6% so one in every 200 overdose deaths and by 2021 it rose to one-third of all [overdose] deaths.Original article: Charting the Fourth Wave: Geographic, Temporal, Race/Ethnicity, and Demographic Trends in Polysubstance Fentanyl Overdose Deaths in the United States, 2010-2021 by Joseph Friedman and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Rob Calder talks to Vassilis Sideropoulos about a recent paper on the role of vaping products in smoking cessation. The first author for this paper was Dr Catherine Kimber.Vassilis talks about the array of components that can contribute to quitting smoking when using vaping products. He summarises the research team’s work on identifying which combinations of support types are most effective. He talks about their research into advice on vaping products, nicotine strength and e-liquid flavours, as well as providing information on the relative harms of vaping and smoking and text message support.There's so many different flavours right now you can pick up almost anything now..... it's a massive raise and I think that's why flavour is a component that we need to understand better.Vassilis also talks about the challenges of recruiting participants from social media and how to exclude bots from your research participant group.Original article: E-cigarette support for smoking cessation: Identifying the effectiveness of intervention components in an on-line randomized optimization experiment by Catherine Kimber and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Rob Calder talks to Dr Eleni Domzaridou about her recent article on the risk of overdose among people prescribe medication for opioid use at the same time as being prescribed other medication - such as for mental health disorders.People who use opioid drugs are often prescribed drugs for physical or mental health problems or for pain management. Eleni and the research team studied non-fatal overdoses among this group of people. In this podcast, Eleni outlines why the marker of non-fatal overdose is important when seeking to prevent fatal overdoses. Eleni also talks about the challenges and practicalities of using a large data-set with data from GP surgeries to draw conclusions about associations between prescribed drug use and overdoses.There is an elevated non-fatal overdose risk for patients prescribed opioid agonists concurrently with benzodiazepines, gabapentinoids, z-drugs or antipsychotics.Original article: Non-fatal overdose risk associated with prescribing opioid agonists concurrently with other medication: cohort study conducted using linked primary care, secondary care, and mortality records by Eleni Domzaridou and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Ben Scher talks to Dr Rebecca McKetin about her recent article looking the relationship between psychosis, psychotic symptoms and methamphetamine use. They discuss the implications and talk about who exactly is at risk of methamphetamine-related psychosis. Along the way, they cover the background of methamphetamine use in Australia and how this varies from country to country.They then discuss the relative risk for psychotic symptoms among people with and without a family history of psychosis. The risk also changes when people are (or are not) actively using methamphetamine. Rebecca also talks about the potential for people to progress to schizophrenia and how treatment services should respond. Rebecca talks about the range of interventions that could be used to address methamphetamine related risks use and drug-related mental health problems.We need to target methamphetamine use as a risk factor for psychosis, regardless of whether people have a history of psychosis on their family.... the other one is that we need to be looking at people who do have a family history of psychosis at being at very high risk of having psychotic symptoms.Original article: How does a family history of psychosis influence the risk of methamphetamine-related psychotic symptoms: Evidence from longitudinal panel data by Rebecca McKetin and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Dr Elle Wadsworth talks to Dr Katherine Keyes about her study examining changes to hallucinogen use among young adults in the US. Katherine also talks about using the Monitoring The Future survey to identify patterns of substance use among young adults."...going from 2020 to 2021 we really saw substantial increases in the prevalence of young adults who are reporting that they use hallucinogens other than LSD. And we didn't see the same trend of use of LSD."Original article: Hallucinogen use among young adults ages 19–30 in the United States: Changes from 2018 to 2021 by Katherine M. Keyes and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Ben Scher talks to Professor Louise Nadeau about her recent article anaysing the content of a Latin-language treatise on gambling addiction written nearly 500 years ago. Ben and Louise discuss the medical model of gambling and issues of historic identification. They unpick how the original authors wrote about the medical model of addiction long before it was called that. Parts of the treatise refer to non-problematic gambling - noting that there was a small population who had problems. There are also references to gambling harms and models of treatment that go back to the 6th century AD. This podcast offers a fascinating historical insight in a way that illuminates our current understanding of addiction and co-occurring disorders."So here was this person in 1561 who was thinking of erroneous cognitions who thought of genetic vulnerability - all that at the end of the Renaissance."Original article: A re-discovered treatise from 1561 by Louise Nadeau and Marc Valleur. Published in Addiction (2023) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Chloe Burke talks to Dr Jamie Hartmann-Boyce about new guidance from the Cochrane Tobacco Addiction Group (TAG) on assessing and minimising risk of bias in tobacco cessation trials. Jamie explains some of the key challenges in this area and explains some of the primary sources of bias that authors need to be aware of when analysing tobacco cessation trials. This article was published as part of Addiction's Methods and Techniques series."We wanted to do this to make sure people were assessing it [risk of bias] well, but also to put in some sort of consistency across our reviews so that the different author teams working on them were broadly using the same criteria"Original article: Assessing and minimizing risk of bias in randomized controlled trials of tobacco cessation interventions: Guidance from the Cochrane Tobacco Addiction Group by Jamie Hartmann-Boyce and Nicola Lindson. Published in Addiction (2023) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Dr Elle Wadsworth talks to Dr Janni Leung about her work on a systematic review of the evidence on cannabis arrests, cannabis products and prices since Canada legalised cannabis. Janni talks discusses how arrest figures have changed, along with trends in legal and illicit purchase of cannabis. She covers issues relating to cannabis packaging and the potential for this to have an impact on people who do not purchase cannabis. They also discuss cannabis legalisation in the context of driving and traffic-related injuries."We found that after cannabis legalisation there have been significant reductions in cannabis arrests. This means that less police time and efforts have been spent arresting people for cannabis use"Original article: The implementation and public health impacts of cannabis legalization in Canada: a systematic review by Wayne Hall and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Ben Scher talks to Dr Thomas Brothers about his qualitative systematic review looking at infections from injecting drug use. Tommy and Ben talk about bacterial and fungal infections and how social and structural factors can have a detrimental impact on access to treatment and health outcomes for people who use drugs. Tommy discusses the differences between countries, highlighting that the prevalence of injecting drug use is not always matched by increases in infections from injecting drug use. They talk about the influence of fentanyl, changes in drug use, drug supply and drug policy, whilst noting that the study found increases in bacterial infections that could not always be explained by these factors.In many of these countries there's been worsening economic and equality, worsening homelessness and our findings suggest that those sorts of economic policy factors are playing a big role in making people vulnerable to infections.Tommy also talks to Ben about conducting a qualitative systematic review, discussing the three steps of using thematic synthesis methods.Original article: Social and structural determinants of injection drug use-associated bacterial and fungal infections: A qualitative systematic review and thematic synthesis by Thomas D. Brothers and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Rob Calder talks to Marleen Olthof and Dr Matthijs Blankers about their research into ICan - a digital health app designed to reduce cannabis use. They initially talk about the potential of using apps to improve health and support people who use drugs before also discussing how apps can improve access to support. “It’s a much smaller step to sign up for a digital intervention than to enter treatment”- Marleen Olthof They discuss how complicated it can be to 'blind' people to a particular condition when researching digital apps and the techniques they used to run a single-blind randomised controlled trial. They then discuss the implications of their findings. Matthijs discusses pre-registration and how this helped the team to prepare; and, how open science principles benefit researchers throughout the research cycle.Original article: A guided digital intervention to reduce cannabis use: The ICan randomized controlled trial by Marleen Olthof and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023)  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Professor Joanne Neale talks to Addiction Audio about her latest research into how people feel during the first 72 hours of having long-acting buprenorphine (Buvidal). Jo talks about the recent history of this medication and how it predated the COVID-19 pandemic and was then brought to attention because it meant that people did not have to attend a pharmacy on a daily basis. Jo also talks about how this can be positive for some people but isn't appropriate for everyone.Jo discusses the gap in the literature around how people respond to long-acting buprenorphine when it is first administered. Jo presents data from the first wave of a longitudinal study examining people's experiences throughout the medication. The findings from this first set of data will be used to help people prepare for the effects and to know what to expect.Jo discusses using an embodiment and embodied cognition approach when analysing the data. This was chosen because the researchers saw how the data quickly became complex."People had these positive and negative experiences at the same time simultaneously; sometimes they were positive physical effects, sometimes they were positive psychological effects, sometimes they were negative physical effects, sometimes they were negative psychological effects. And when we started to map this out, we could see that it was quite complicated and that everything was interacting. And that brought us round to thinking that the concept of embodiment and embodied cognition are quite helpful here because they help us understand how the mind and body interact."Original article: How do patients feel during the first 72 h after initiating long-acting injectable buprenorphine? An embodied qualitative analysis by Joanne Neale and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dr Perski explains the evolution of Ecological Momentry Assessment (EMA) studies and how they have been used to collect granular data relating to everyday experiences. Olga's latest review focuses on EMA studies and smoking, looking at lapse and relapse. She talks about how EMA can be used to test and develop models and theories of addiction in ways that cross-sectional studies cannot. She also covers how you can use EMA to capture fluctuating and dynamic changes among people who use drugs."If we go back to thinking about more traditional survey based studies which would measure these constructs weeks apart - knowing that lapses can happen very rapidly in response to very rapidly increased cravings or a cue in the environment. For example, in a bar or restaurant where someone would pick up a cigarette that can very rapidly lead to a lapse. I think that helps emphasis the point that Ecological Momentary Assessment and maybe also sensor data is required in order to pick up these very very rapid fluctuations."Olga then talks about developing an appraisal tool for assessing the quality of EMA studies, which involves looking at reporting guidelines. She then talks about how and why open science principles can be applied to EMA studies.Original article: Within-person associations between psychological and contextual factors and lapse incidence in smokers attempting to quit: A systematic review and meta-analysis of Ecological Momentary Assessment studies by Olga Perski and Colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Rob talks to Dr Will Lawn about his research into the acute effects of cannabis on young people and adults. Will talks about setting up a study looking at young people and adults’ experiences of using cannabis with different levels of cannabidiol. He talks about the challenges of blinding participants to different types of cannabis; about how to manage the placebo effect when participants can become quickly aware of whether they have or have not had cannabis and the challenges of running a trial involving a controlled drug.He discusses the study’s findings that suggest that teenagers respond similarly to adults in the acute stages of cannabis use and experience the same short-term harms as adults.He also talks about the importance of selecting the best episode of The Simpsons for an academic study.“In the last four to five years there’s been a swing towards thinking CBD doesn’t really moderate the impact of THC at these kind of 1 to 30mg dose levels”Dr Will Lawn is a Lecturer at King’s College London Psychology DepartmentOriginal article: ‘The acute effects of cannabis with and without cannabidiol in adults and adolescents: a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled, crossover experiment by Will Lawn and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2023)  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Dr Katherine East talks about her recent article on heated tobacco product use. When conducting this research, Katie talked to former and current smokers who use IQOS to understand the words they use to describe themselves and what they do in relation to heated tobacco products. Katie and Rob then talk about how the language can reflect identity and how this can influence the risk of people relapsing to smoking or other forms of nicotine use. They discuss the importance of social norms and how language can play a substantial role in shaping those norms. Katie explains why some potential words that might have been used have since been discarded, including “heaters” and “IQOSers”. They also talk about different social circumstances and how heated tobacco use, vaping and smoking identities interact. Link to Katie’s previous podcast“Lots of people refer to it as smoking still…. It also means less having to explain what it is because very few people have heard of IQOS”“The way that people refer to things and they way they think about themselves as product users can influence their behaviour.”“Whilst people referred to IQOS use as smoking they were very resistant to being identified as a smoker”. Original article: ‘It's not what you'd term normal smoking’: a qualitative exploration of language used to describe heated tobacco product use and associated user identity by Katherine East and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2022). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Harry Tattan-Birch talks about his recent article on the increased popularity of disposable vaping products. He discusses the difference between this new generation of vaping products compared with the original versions.He talks about the data that suggest a rise in vaping alongside a lack of change in use of nicotine products overall. And the three reasons why disposable vapes have become more popular; including the low up-front cost, nicotine delivery/nicotine salts, and the convenience.“You can just walk into a shop, buy a device, open the packet and instantly start using it. you don’t have to know anything about coils… the concentration of e-liquid, you don’t have to charge it.”Harry also talks about how the team were able to publish relatively soon after noticing the trend. He talks about using data from the Smoking Toolkit Study and how this supports efficient and effective publishing, enabling researchers to see what’s happening real-time on the nicotine market. Original article: Rapid growth in disposable e-cigarette vaping among young adults in Great Britain from 2021 to 2022: a repeat cross-sectional survey by Harry Tattan-Birch and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2022) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode of Addiction Audio, Rob Talks to Dr Ashley Gearhardt from the University of Michigan about whether highly processed foods can be considered to be addictive substances.Dr Gearhardt starts by defining highly processed foods before covering the issues that arise from having an addictive substance (such as food) that you can’t ‘opt out’ of. Ashley makes comparisons with other addictive substances noting that highly processed foods can induce cravings and lead to a loss of control. She then talks about which foods have a bigger impact on addictive behaviours highlighting foods that contain refined sugars and added fats such as pizzas and donuts.Rob and Ashley then discuss the limits to research whereby there is little agreement on how to define an addictive substance. This is in stark contrast with a growing consensus on how to identify addictive behaviours. There are, for example, agreed diagnostic criteria for addiction, but there is less agreement on how to define whether a substance is addictive.They also talk about how a substance that isn’t intoxicating can be addictive.“It isn’t necessarily the amount of pleasure or liking you get at the moment you consume them [highly processed foods], but the ability that they have to sensitise motivation systems to want more and more and more”“We argue that we need to treat these highly processed foods, not so much as foods per se but as highly refined substances that have been engineered to be incredibly rewarding.”Original article: Highly processed foods can be considered addictive substances based on established scientific criteria by Ashley Gearhardt and Alexandra DiFeliceantonio. Published in Addiction (2022) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode of Addiction Audio, Rob talks to Ebtesam Saleh a Doctoral student at the Charite university in Berlin. Ebtesam talks about her recent systematic review of qualitative research on substance use among refugees. She talks about talks about the limitations of using survey data to explore this issue and how qualitative research can help contextualise the problems faced by refugees in a culturally sensitive way. Ebtesam discusses the impact that research can have and how researchers can minimise the potential for re-traumatisation through research interviews. She also discusses the cultural differences in how people view substances and substance use. With substances like coca, betul quid and prescription drugs being viewed, legislated and used in different ways in different countries. There are also multiple barriers to treatment that refugees can experience from stigma to a lack of resources and including structural factors such as health insurance requirements in different countries. Ebtesam then talks about the many refugee groups whose experiences are not present in the literature:“For example, Yemen hosts many refugee populations from African conflict countries; while Yemen itself is a country struggling with civil war, so it looks like a refugee crisis within a country of crisis. So, a crisis within the crisis” Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode of Addiction Audio, Drs Mignonne Guy and Megan Piper talk about their work on the racial equity taskforce for the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco (SRNT). It was a powerful and wide-ranging discussion about developing anti-racist practice, social constructs of race, research methods, society organisations and research funding structures. Megan and Mignonne began by talking about why the racial equity taskforce was set up, how they determined what to do and the findings of the SRNT policy review. They then discuss wider issues of race and inequality that run throughout academia, describing how health disparity research can be suppressed and discouraged as well as the impact of the tobacco industry’s racist history. The discussion then focuses on how key research concepts – including methods often considered central to public health research – need to change or be replaced in order to eliminate the impact of structural racism on research and on population health. They finally offer advice to organisations about how to undertake their own racial equity reviews. “When we look at our policies and we see that there’s nothing about race, no, that’s not surprising … because that’s how this invisible dominant whiteness takes over everything – by excluding those groups and not explicitly referring to other populations.” - Dr Mignonne Guy  “So, this scientific premise that we have been operating under and training …. so many scientists under that the population can be controlled for doesn’t work. [This] really does elevate the importance of studying specific populations because their experiences are so very different they can’t be controlled for.” - Dr Megan Piper “We’re asking people to divest from their scientific legacy and to try to construct something new and be part of that and pioneering this type of work” - Dr Mignonne Guy Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode we talk to Dr Sharon Cox about developing an ontology around nicotine and tobacco products. Sharon also talks about the importance of ontologies and how they are important for research. She talks about how to manage disagreements when developing a system that categorises and defines products, behaviours and properties. “So, as researchers, which we are, we should be pedants and we should think it’s important that the products we write about we write about with accuracy.”  “Because we want to be clear, we want to be really clear with the public. We want to make sure that we’re writing lay outputs, developing ad campaigns advising companies….. we want to make sure that we’re communicating the science of our subject as clearly as we can. And that really starts with our academic work.”  Original article: Toward an ontology of tobacco, nicotine and vaping products by Sharon Cox and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2022) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Professor Matt Hickman talks about using population modelling to identify the population implications of Opioid Agonist Treatment (OAT). He covers the impact that OAT has on drug-related deaths and other causes of mortality as well as how models can be used to explore what mortality rates would have been without OAT in New South Wales, Australia.Professor Hickman talks about their findings that, without OAT, the number of overdose deaths would have been 50% higher.“So, what we were trying to do in this study was to model the counter-factual of how many deaths there would be if there hadn’t been any opioid agonist treatment. In theory the ideal model would be a trial in which you have OAT versus no OAT in a population, now clearly that’s unethical and can’t be done.”He also talks about how the research team set up a dynamic model that they used to explore the data, matching incarceration and OAT records. They then used those data alongside findings from systematic reviews to model the hypothetical impact of OAT on a real population.“We’ve done models before, theoretical models which say ‘if we increase the opioid agonist treatment programme and we increase duration at a certain point what impact would that have?’ but that’s rarely based on actual real data. So …there’s modelling and there’s modelling, and this model is based on real empirical data and we think that gives it a bit more credence”. Original paper here: Modeling the population-level impact of opioid agonist treatment on mortality among people accessing treatment between 2001 and 2020 in New South Wales, Australia by Antoine Chaillon and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2022) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Dr Alexander Denissoff talks about his recent research into the potential associations between cannabis use and later life bipolar disorder. He discusses the basis for hypotheses that link cannabis and bipolar disorder, outlining what the Northern Finland Birth Cohort is and how it was used in this study.“It’s an ongoing birth cohort which included 99% of all live births in the two northern-most provinces in Finland between July 1985 and June 1986 and originally included 9,432 live born children. And 73.8% of the participants originally included in the cohort were included in this study…. It’s an exceptional dataset considering the generalisability of the results to the general population” Dr Denissoff talks about his finding that associations between cannabis use and bipolar disorder did not persist once other factors were accounted for. “The association attenuated to non-significant after adjusting to frequent alcohol intoxications, illicit drug use and daily smoking. But even if the association was not seen as independent of other substances, early cannabis use can nevertheless be thought of as a signal of a potential adverse mental health trajectory.”Original research article: Is Early Exposure to Cannabis Associated with Bipolar disorder? Results from a Finnish Birth-Cohort Study. By Alexander Denissoff and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2022) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Tori Horn from the University of Memphis talks about her recent systematic review of risk-taking and gambling whilst drinking.Tori talks about the moderators between alcohol and risk-taking and how her and her colleagues screened 30,000 papers to examine the influence of blood alcohol concentration, gender, the type of gambling and other factors as potential moderators of this relationship.“We thought perhaps that, what’s influencing this is the expectancies, and the vast majority of studies included used the placebo design […] which led us to conclude that maybe people are expecting, once they’re told they’re consuming alcohol, that their behaviour’s going to be different.” Tori talks about the different ways that risk-taking is measured in studies, including inflating balloons until they burst for a cash pay-out. She also explores the problems with lab designs and the challenge of translating research into naturalistic settings. Original research article: Does acute alcohol consumption increase risk-taking while gambling? A systematic review and meta-analysis. By Tori Horn and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2022). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode of the Addiction Audio podcast, Dr Paolo Deluca talks about his recent research on using brief interventions in emergency departments.The research involved a three-armed randomised controlled trial on brief interventions for young people, and found no significant differences in alcohol-related outcomes between young people who had been given a brief intervention and those who had not. In the podcast, Paolo reflects on some of the potential reasons for this, considering previous evidence in support of brief interventions.“When you move away from an efficacy trial or a single site study where you have highly trained professionals or practitioners delivering the interventions and you move into the real-world NHS setting is where you tend to lose some of the effectiveness you might have had in the early stages of the brief intervention.”Paolo also talks about the core components of brief interventions that can be delivered in 10 minutes in busy emergency departments, and discusses some of the logistical and ethical challenges of recruiting young people to a three-armed trial.“We involved 10 emergency departments, and we ran it for around 8 months and were recruiting from 10am to 10pm in the afternoon and we were covering 7 days a week. To achieve that we had essentially an army of researchers.”Original article: Effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of face-to-face and electronic brief interventions versus screening alone to reduce alcohol consumption among high risk adolescents presenting to Emergency Departments: three-arm pragmatic randomised trial (SIPS Junior High Risk Trial). By Paolo Deluca and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2022). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode of Addiction Audio, Nazlee Maghsoudi talks about her recent publication “Drug checking services for people who use drugs: a systematic review”. Nazlee discusses how drug checking services change behaviour, contribute to drug market monitoring and otherwise impact the risk associated with using substances. She talks about the three waves of drug checking services from the late 1960s to present day. Nazlee talks about the benefits of working with library sciences experts when setting the search parameters for her systematic review. She also talks about how important it is for physicians or GPs to know what substances people might have taken. “We know from the systematic review [people who use drug checking services] do make changes in their behaviour, they do take that information into account, and whether it’s choosing to not use, choosing to use less, choosing to seek more information before they use, that gives them information to make more informed choices about the drugs they use.” Nazlee is the Manager of the Policy Impact Unit at the Centre on Drug Policy Evaluation in Toronto, and a PhD Candidate in Health Services Research at the Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation within the University of Toronto.Original research article: Drug checking services for people who use drugs: a systematic review By Nazlee Maghsoudi and colleagues. Published in Addiction (2021) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dr Iain Hardie talks to Addiction Audio about his research into alcohol use changes during lockdown. His research is the first to report longitudinal data on changes in drinking quantities and characteristics. Dr Hardie talks about using an interrupted time series analysis to identify the impact of the pandemic on drinking habits. “A lot of [drinking] occasions in general that start earlier in the day are quite often people meeting up for long drinking occasions or big social occasions that last the whole day, whereas when lockdowns were in place those occasions weren’t possible so people were drinking later on in the day” Iain discusses how Scotland and England differ in the numbers of people who drink alone and talks about the potential long-term consequences resulting from changes in drinking patters whereby more people currently drink at home and fewer go out to pubs and bars.   Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode of Addiction Audio, Professor John Marsden talks about the role of pre-registration in increasing research transparency. He addresses the anxieties that people can have about pre-registration and talks about how it’s really not that difficult or daunting.Professor Marsden talks gets into the detail of pre-registration; when to register, how to register and the importance of planning for – and dealing with – missing data. He covers how plans change during any research project and how to respond when they do. The importance of pre-registration also includes qualitative research and Professor Marsden talks about the need for more qualitative and observational studies to be pre-registered.“We’re really trying to encourage people to just plan, adapt if you need to, change if you have to – but just have a clear narrative about that – and everyone benefits. It means that what was done is much more reproducible.”Professor John Marsden is the Editor-in-Chief of the journal Addiction. He is Professor of Addiction psychology at the Addictions Department, the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, Kings College London.Marsden, J, Cousijn, J and Stapleton, J, Pre‐registration: not a daunting practice. Addiction. 2022. https://doi.org/10.1111/add.15819 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dr Elis Haan talks to Dr Rob Calder about ADHD and maternal substance use. She discusses her recent paper which explored the impact of smoking, alcohol and drugs during pregnancy on ADHD outcomes in young people.Elis talks about the differences between maternal and teacher ratings of ADHD. She also explains negative control and polygenic risk score methods used in this study discussing how multiple methods were used across different longitudinal datasets to add confidence to their analysis. “Combining these different methods can help to gain stronger support for a causal effect…. For example, if these different methods and analyses across these cohorts provide similar results we can be more confident that the results reflect a true causal effect. This is because it is unlikely that these different methods will be all biased in the same way”Haan E, Sallis HM, Zuccolo L,Labrecque J, Ystrom E, Reichborn-Kjennerud T, et al. Prenatal smoking, alcohol and caffeine exposure and maternal-reported attention deficit hyperactivity disorder symptoms in childhood: triangulation of evidence using negative control and polygenic risk score analyses. Addiction. 2021;1–14. https://doi.org/10.1111/add.15746. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Rob Calder talks to Dr Olga Perski about her recent research on just-in-time adaptive interventions (JITAIs) whereby smartphones are used to help prevent lapses among people who are trying to quit or reduce alcohol, tobacco or other drug use. Dr Perski talks about why the literature is so complex and how defining JITAIs is difficult in the first place. She talks about the potential for Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA), GPS positioning and micro-randomised trial studies to contribute in this area, and how we may not want to press ahead with full-scale RCTs before having conducted additional conceptual and computational work to clarify what JITAIs are and how to develop them. Dr Perski also discusses the challenges of regulating mobile health apps so that people can access apps based on evidence of effectiveness. This episode was recorded online on 30 September 2021.Perski, O., Hébert, E.T., Naughton, F., Hekler, E.B., Brown, J. and Businelle, M.S. Technology‐mediated just‐in‐time adaptive interventions (JITAIs) to reduce harmful substance use: A systematic review. Addiction 2021; doi:10.1111/add.15687 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Rob Calder talks to Professor John Marsden about cocaine cravings. Professor Marsden discusses the lack of pharmacological treatments for cocaine, and about his recent study using mental imagery to address cocaine cravings. He talks about the benefits of positive imagery compared with negative imagery. He then discusses how useful mixed-methods research can be and the importance of writing up data from unfinished trials. Lowry, N., Marsden, J., Clydesdale, B., Eastwood, B., Havelka, E.M. and Goetz, C. Acute impact of self‐guided mental imagery on craving in cocaine use disorder: a mixed‐methods analysis of a randomized controlled trial. Addiction 2021; doi:10.1111/add.15405https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/add.15405 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Professor Alison Ritter talks about her recent paper “Are market mechanisms associated with alcohol and other drug treatment outcomes” and about the Australian context of drug treatment provision and commissioning. We discuss the challenges of measuring outcomes against commissioning structures and Professor Ritter explains how funding arrangements can end up looking like a bowl of spaghetti. Alison discusses why governments don’t necessarily have to tender competitively, about the burdens associated with the machinery of recommissioning and about the potential for fixed-price tendering to improve the quality of addiction treatment services.Ritter, A., van de Ven, K., Vuong, T., Chalmers, J., Dobbins, T., Livingston, M. and Berends, L. Are market mechanisms associated with alcohol and other drug treatment outcomes?. Addiction 2021; doi:10.1111/add.15681 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/add.15681 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Rob Calder talks to Professor Robert West about the Paper Authoring Tool (PAT). Professor West talks about how PAT can be used in the design and write-up phases of a randomised controlled trials, about how it saves time for reviewers and journals and about how using the PAT can make your research more rigorous, well reported and discoverable. He also discusses the future of research publishing and how computer reading can save months or years on evidence synthesis and how this relates to the Human Behaviour Change Project. There is also a small section on the interaction between computers, humans and chess.West, R. PAT: an on‐line paper authoring tool for writing up randomized controlled trials. Addiction 2021; 116: 1938-1940paperauthoringtool.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jack Wilson talks to Rob Calder about his recent systematic review and meta-analysis on whether cannabis use increases the likelihood of later life opioid use or opioid use disorders. Jack talks about the limitations of the literature, the influence that the gateway hypothesis has had on policy and on some of the different types of studies that explore this issue. Wilson J, Mills K, Freeman TP, Sunderland M, Visontay R, and Marel C. Weeding out the truth: a systematic review and meta-analysis on the transition from cannabis use to opioid use and opioid use disorders, abuse or dependence. Addiction 2021; doi:10.1111/add.15581 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/add.15581 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dr Emma Johnson talks to Rob Calder about shared genetic liabilities for cannabis use disorder and schizophrenia and the role of tobacco smoking. Dr Johnson talks about the implications of this research on the evidence for a causal relationship between cannabis and schizophrenia and for other genetic associations relating to substance use and psychiatric disorders. The episode also covers to ever-fascinating issue of mendelian randomisation. (Be sure to check out episode 22 too!)Johnson E.C., Hatoum A.S., Deak J.D., Polimanti R, Murray R.M., Edenberg H.J., et al. The relationship between cannabis and schizophrenia: a genetically informed perspective. Addiction 2021 https://doi.org/10.1111/add.15534 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Rob Calder talks to Dr Thomas Mason about his research on pay for performance models of addiction treatment and how they were associated with increased emergency hospital admissions. Mason T, Whittaker W, Jones A, Sutton M. Did paying drugs misuse treatment providers for outcomes lead to unintended consequences for hospital admissions? Difference-in-differences analysis of a pay-for-performance scheme in England. Addiction 2021 https://doi.org/10.1111/add.15486 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Rob Calder talks to Dr Máirtín McDermott and Dr Leonie Brose about their research into the effectiveness of e-cigarettes for quitting smoking.McDermott M.S, East K.A, Brose L.S, McNeill A, Hitchman S.C, Partos T.R. The effectiveness of using e‐cigarettes for quitting smoking compared to other cessation methods among adults in the United Kingdom. Addiction 2021. https://doi.org/10.1111/add.15474 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.