Medical Detox Procedures

Medical detox is a type of drug treatment that uses prescription drugs and other medical procedures to help alleviate the withdrawal effects from stopping alcohol and drugs, such as sweats, tremors, and sometime hallucinations. Stopping a drug you have taken for a long time is painful, but medical professionals know how to treat detox symptoms with medications that help a patient through the detox process.

Central Nervous System Depressants

• Drugs that depress the nervous system include barbiturates, such as Phenobarbital, an anticonvulsant drug; Seconal, which is a sleeping pill; benzodiazepines, such as Xanax, diazepam such as Valium, and chlordiazepoxide such as Librium. The latter drugs are tranquilizers or anti-anxiety drugs generally prescribed to people with anxiety issues.

  Symptoms of an overdose of drugs and alcohol, another central nervous system depressant, include sleepiness, confusion, dizziness, and slurred speech. Stopping drugs and alcohol can have painful consequences such as tremors, body pain, and vomiting.

  Sometimes those with heavy alcohol, barbiturate or tranquilizer use, whether from illegal or prescription drugs, may need medication to help them through the detox process. Many rehabilitation centers use the medical model of medical detoxification in severe cases by using drugs such as Methadone or Naltrexone. Naltrexone, known as Depade or ReVia, works by desensitizing alcoholics and abusers of barbiturates by blocking the part of the brain that feels pleasure when using alcohol or drugs. Generally, the patients must stop drinking alcohol and using drugs while on the Naltrexone.

  In the case of an overdose from cocaine, the doctor will administer diazepam, especially if the person is agitated or violent. Rapid detox centers use drugs such as Subutex, an opiate, to help alleviate cravings. Naltrexone is also used. Rapid detox treatments last generally five to eight hours and used for opiate abusers.

Central Nervous Symptom Stimulants

• Central nervous symptom stimulants include amphetamines, methamphetamine, cocaine and methylphenidate or Ritalin. Symptoms of dependency on these drugs are euphoria, rapid speech, and restlessness and insomnia.

  Sometimes, patients may exhibit symptoms of acute psychosis. A common medication used in stimulant withdrawal is Haldol or Haloperidol, which is typically used to treat psychosis, according to American Academy of Family Physicians. Another medication used to fight stimulants is Parlodel, which normalizes the dopamine receptors in the brain. Parlodel reduces cravings and the severe forms of withdrawal symptoms.

Club drugs

• Although addiction rarely occurs with the designer drugs, you can become emotionally dependent on the drugs because of the high they can produce. Overdoses are more common with these drugs and can occur with any drug and require medical attention.

  Designer drugs or club drugs are popular with young adults. Designer drugs include ecstasy, which is a stimulant and often homemade; GHB, more commonly known as the 'date rape' drug, and Ketamine, also known as special-K and used in animal medicine, according to emedicinehealth.com.
  Continued use of these drugs can result in brain damage.

  Designer drug overdoses, unless the patient is severely agitated, generally is not treated with medication, but often treated with gastric lavage or stomach pump to remove any unabsorbed drug in the stomach. Activated charcoal, which binds the drug in the stomach to prevent the drug from traveling into the blood stream, is another medical method for detox intervention. The charcoal elimination is through the stool.