SITUATION: Multiple sclerosis belongs to the most common chronic neurological disease of the central nervous system. The disease is incurable, however it is treatable. Modern medicine has a variety of medications to relieve the symptoms and slowing the onset and progression. In many cases, however, treatment is not effective and often causes side effects. Cannabis and its products are used in the symptomatic and causal therapy of many diseases. The efficacy of cannabis treatment in multiple sclerosis is confirmed by several studies. Medical cannabis is a way how to relieve pain and muscle spasms. In 2013 in the Czech Republic there have been changes in laws allowing prescribing cannabis for medical treatment. OBJECTIVES: The study's goal is to describe the issues of self-medication using medical cannabis from the perspective of people suffering from multiple sclerosis. The primary objective is to map the following areas: introduction to cannabis and motivation to self- medication, frequency and methods of self-medication, therapeutic effects experienced during self-medication, side effects experienced during self-medication, perspectives of cannabis use in the future. METHODOLOGY: Self-selection in combination with snowball sampling method was used to obtain survey respondents. Data in this study...

Purpose of Review: This review aims to (1) conceptualize the complexity of the opioid use disorder epidemic using a conceptual model grounded in the disease continuum and corresponding levels of prevention and (2) summarize a select set of interventions for the prevention and treatment of opioid use disorder. Recent Findings: Epidemiologic data indicate non-medical prescription and illicit opioid use have reached unprecedented levels, fueling an opioid use disorder epidemic in the USA. A problem of this magnitude is rooted in multiple supply- and demand-side drivers, the combined effect of which outweighs current prevention and treatment efforts. Multiple primary, secondary, and tertiary prevention interventions, both evidence-informed and evidence-based, are available to address each point along the disease continuum—non-use, initiation, dependence, addiction, and death. Summary: If interventions grounded in the best available evidence are disseminated and implemented across the disease continuum in a coordinated and collaborative manner, public health systems could be increasingly effective in responding to the epidemic./p>

Diploma thesis "Marihuana: drug or medicine?" deals with recent change of a medicine law and with process enabling treatment by marihuana. It identifies stakeholders and advocacy coalitions involved in the law and public policy enforcement and explains what is the motivation for these coalitions and on which values is the motivation based. Using event analysis this thesis shows timeline of events moving towards the change of the law and reveals the stakeholders who are significant for the change. Their public speeches are analyzed and stakeholders are divided into advocacy coalitions on the basis of the analysis. The conclusion of the qualitative content analysis is verified by half structured interviews with stakeholders representing the coalitions. Three coalitions were identified in cannabis subsystem. First of them is liberal and tries to get the legalization trough, the second one tries to enable a treatment by marihuana for patients and the third coalition is skeptic to cannabis treatment. The thesis explains a participation of these coalitions on the change and their relations to each other.

L’émergence de l’utilisation du méthylphénidate (MPH; Ritalin) par des étudiants universitaires afin d’améliorer leur concentration et leurs performances universitaires suscite l’intérêt du public et soulève d’importants débats éthiques auprès des spécialistes. Les différentes perspectives sur l’amélioration des performances cognitives représentent une dimension importante des défis sociaux et éthiques autour d’un tel phénomène et méritent d’être élucidées. Ce mémoire vise à examiner les discours présents dans les reportages internationaux de presse populaire, les discours en bioéthique et en en santé publique sur le thème de l’utilisation non médicale du méthylphénidate. Cette recherche a permis d’identifier et d’analyser des « lacunes » dans les perspectives éthiques, sociales et scientifiques de l’utilisation non médicale du méthylphénidate pour accroître la performance cognitive d’individus en santé. Une analyse systématique du contenu des discours sur l’utilisation non médicale du méthylphénidate pour accroître la performance cognitive a identifié des paradigmes divergents employés pour décrire l’utilisation non médicale du méthylphénidate et discuter ses conséquences éthiques. Les paradigmes « choix de mode de vie », « abus de médicament » et « amélioration de la cognition » sont présents dans les discours de la presse populaire, de la bioéthique et de la santé publique respectivement. Parmi les principales différences entre ces paradigmes, on retrouve : la description de l’utilisation non médicale d’agents neuropharmacologiques pour l’amélioration des performances, les risques et bénéfices qui y sont associés, la discussion d’enjeux éthiques et sociaux et des stratégies de prévention et les défis associés à l’augmentation de la prévalence de ce phénomène. La divergence de ces paradigmes reflète le pluralisme des perceptions de l’utilisation non médicale d’agents neuropharmacologiques Nos résultats suggèrent la nécessité de débats autour de l’amélioration neuropharmacologique afin de poursuivre l’identification des enjeux et de développer des approches de santé publique cohérentes. / The non-medical use of neuropharmaceuticals has sparked ethical debates. For example, there is mounting evidence that methylphenidate (MPH; Ritalin) is being used by healthy university students to improve concentration, alertness, and academic performance, a phenomenon known as cognitive enhancement. The different perspectives on the ethics of cognitive enhancement represent an important dimension of the social and ethical challenges related to such practices but have yet to be examined thoroughly. This thesis aimed to assess existing positive and negative reports in international print media, bioethics literature, and public health literature on the use of MPH to identify and analyze gaps in the ethical, social, and scientific perspectives about the non-medical use of MPH for cognitive enhancement in healthy individuals. A systematic content analysis of discourses on the non-medical use of methylphenidate for cognitive enhancement identified divergent frameworks employed to describe the non-medical use of methylphenidate and discuss its ethical implications: The frameworks of “lifestyle choice”, “prescription drug abuse” and “cognitive enhancement” are present in print media, bioethics, and public health discourses respectively. Important differences between frameworks include the description of the non-medical use of neuropharmaceuticals for cognitive enhancement, associated risks and benefits, discussion of ethical and social issues surrounding the phenomenon and the prevention strategies and challenges to the widespread use of neuropharmaceuticals for cognitive enhancement. Diverging frameworks reflect pluralism in perceptions if the non-medical use of neuropharmaceuticals for cognitive enhancement. At this time, unacknowledged pluralism and implicit assumptions about cognitive enhancement may impede public health interventions and ethics discussions.

L’émergence de l’utilisation du méthylphénidate (MPH; Ritalin) par des étudiants universitaires afin d’améliorer leur concentration et leurs performances universitaires suscite l’intérêt du public et soulève d’importants débats éthiques auprès des spécialistes. Les différentes perspectives sur l’amélioration des performances cognitives représentent une dimension importante des défis sociaux et éthiques autour d’un tel phénomène et méritent d’être élucidées. Ce mémoire vise à examiner les discours présents dans les reportages internationaux de presse populaire, les discours en bioéthique et en en santé publique sur le thème de l’utilisation non médicale du méthylphénidate. Cette recherche a permis d’identifier et d’analyser des « lacunes » dans les perspectives éthiques, sociales et scientifiques de l’utilisation non médicale du méthylphénidate pour accroître la performance cognitive d’individus en santé. Une analyse systématique du contenu des discours sur l’utilisation non médicale du méthylphénidate pour accroître la performance cognitive a identifié des paradigmes divergents employés pour décrire l’utilisation non médicale du méthylphénidate et discuter ses conséquences éthiques. Les paradigmes « choix de mode de vie », « abus de médicament » et « amélioration de la cognition » sont présents dans les discours de la presse populaire, de la bioéthique et de la santé publique respectivement. Parmi les principales différences entre ces paradigmes, on retrouve : la description de l’utilisation non médicale d’agents neuropharmacologiques pour l’amélioration des performances, les risques et bénéfices qui y sont associés, la discussion d’enjeux éthiques et sociaux et des stratégies de prévention et les défis associés à l’augmentation de la prévalence de ce phénomène. La divergence de ces paradigmes reflète le pluralisme des perceptions de l’utilisation non médicale d’agents neuropharmacologiques Nos résultats suggèrent la nécessité de débats autour de l’amélioration neuropharmacologique afin de poursuivre l’identification des enjeux et de développer des approches de santé publique cohérentes. / The non-medical use of neuropharmaceuticals has sparked ethical debates. For example, there is mounting evidence that methylphenidate (MPH; Ritalin) is being used by healthy university students to improve concentration, alertness, and academic performance, a phenomenon known as cognitive enhancement. The different perspectives on the ethics of cognitive enhancement represent an important dimension of the social and ethical challenges related to such practices but have yet to be examined thoroughly. This thesis aimed to assess existing positive and negative reports in international print media, bioethics literature, and public health literature on the use of MPH to identify and analyze gaps in the ethical, social, and scientific perspectives about the non-medical use of MPH for cognitive enhancement in healthy individuals. A systematic content analysis of discourses on the non-medical use of methylphenidate for cognitive enhancement identified divergent frameworks employed to describe the non-medical use of methylphenidate and discuss its ethical implications: The frameworks of “lifestyle choice”, “prescription drug abuse” and “cognitive enhancement” are present in print media, bioethics, and public health discourses respectively. Important differences between frameworks include the description of the non-medical use of neuropharmaceuticals for cognitive enhancement, associated risks and benefits, discussion of ethical and social issues surrounding the phenomenon and the prevention strategies and challenges to the widespread use of neuropharmaceuticals for cognitive enhancement. Diverging frameworks reflect pluralism in perceptions if the non-medical use of neuropharmaceuticals for cognitive enhancement. At this time, unacknowledged pluralism and implicit assumptions about cognitive enhancement may impede public health interventions and ethics discussions.

The word 'marijuana' was introduced to Australia by the US Bureau of Narcotics via the Diggers newspaper, Smith's Weekly, in 1938. Marijuana was said to be 'a new drug that maddens victims' and it was sensationally described as an 'evil sex drug'. The resulting tabloid furore saw the plant cannabis sativa banned in Australia, even though cannabis had been a well-known and widely used drug in Australia for many decades. In 1964, a massive infestation of wild cannabis was found growing along a stretch of the Hunter River between Singleton and Maitland in New South Wales. The explosion in Australian marijuana use began there. It was fuelled after 1967 by US soldiers on rest and recreation leave from Vietnam. It was the Baby-Boomer young who were turning on. Pot smoking was overwhelmingly associated with the generation born in the decade after the Second World War. As the conflict over the Vietnam War raged in Australia, it provoked intense generational conflict between the Baby-Boomers and older generations. Just as in the US, pot was adopted by Australian Baby-Boomers as their symbol; and, as in the US, the attack on pot users served as code for an attack on the young, the Left, and the alternative. In 1976, the 'War on Drugs' began in earnest in Australia with paramilitary attacks on the hippie colonies at Cedar Bay in Queensland and Tuntable Falls in New South Wales. It was a time of increasing US style prohibition characterised by 'tough-on-drugs' right-wing rhetoric, police crackdowns, numerous murders, and a marijuana drought followed quickly by a heroin plague; in short by a massive worsening of 'the drug problem'. During this decade, organised crime moved into the pot scene and the price of pot skyrocketed, reaching $450 an ounce in 1988. Thanks to the Americanisation of drugs policy, the black market made 'a killing'. In Marijuana Australiana I argue that the 'War on Drugs' developed -- not for health reasons -- but for reasons of social control; as a domestic counter-revolution against the Whitlamite, Baby-Boomer generation by older Nixonite Drug War warriors like Queensland Premier, Bjelke-Petersen. It was a misuse of drugs policy which greatly worsened drug problems, bringing with it American-style organised crime. As the subtitle suggests, Marijuana Australiana relies significantly on 'alternative' sources, and I trawl the waters of popular culture, looking for songs, posters, comics and underground magazines to produce an 'underground' history of cannabis in Australia. This 'pop' approach is balanced with a hard-edged, quantitative analysis of the size of the marijuana market, the movement of price, and the seizure figures in the section called 'History By Numbers'. As Alfred McCoy notes, we need to understand drugs as commodities. It is only through a detailed understanding of the drug trade that the deeper secrets of this underground world can be revealed. In this section, I present an economic history of the cannabis market and formulate three laws of the market.