Advisory

SAMHSA News Offers Index of Year's Top Substance Abuse/Mental Health Stories

The latest issue of SAMHSA News, the newsletter of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, includes a readily searchable index to some of the top stories of 2005 about the federal government's efforts to prevent and treat mental and addictive disorders.

The November/December 2005 edition indexes all of the year’s six issues, which contain articles on topics such as Telepsychiatry and technology-enhanced treatments, office-based buprenorphine treatment of opioid addiction (including addiction to prescription medications), the implications of the new Medicare prescription drug benefit for people with mental illnesses, suicide prevention efforts, and the latest statistics on drug use.

The November/December 2005 issue includes a cover story on the progression of emergency response activities to long-term recovery efforts following Hurricane Katrina. The issue also contains several shorter articles describing aspects of special interest related to the hurricane and disasters in general. These include the needs of children traumatized by the hurricanes and the actions taken to assist them, and the adaptations needed to maintain medication-assisted treatment (methadone and buprenorphine) for people displaced by the hurricanes and addicted to opiates -- including prescription drugs.

The issue also includes a description of updated guidelines for providing effective medication-assisted treatment for opioid addiction. These treatment practices are available in a book, Medication-Assisted Treatment for Opioid Addiction in Opioid Treatment Programs, Treatment Improvement Protocol (TIP) 43, which is available through SAMHSA.

Another article discusses a major, multi-pronged federal effort launched to stop underage drinking and offers resources to assist parents, educators, and others in efforts to help children.

The issue and the complete collection of the year's back issues are available online at www.samhsa.gov/SAMHSA_News . SAMHSA News is published bimonthly in both hard copy and electronic format. To receive a free subscription by mail, telephone 1 (888) 577-8977 (toll-free) or (240) 221-4001 in the Washington, DC, metropolitan area.

SAMHSA, is a public health agency within the Department of Health and Human Services. The agency is responsible for improving the accountability, capacity and effectiveness of the nation’s substance abuse prevention, addictions, treatment, and mental health services delivery system.

SAMHSA is An Agency of the U.S. Department of Health & Human Service