Boarding Schools for Girls

An annual survey from the Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse found that teens are drinking and smoking less but abusing more prescription painkillers, stimulants, and marijuana.

According to the CASA report, smoking and drinking have been on a steady decline since 1997. For example, the percentage of 12th graders drinking decreased from 19% to 11%; among 10th graders, the decline was 43% to 29%.

However, more teenagers are using prescription drugs, especially painkillers OxyContin and Vicodin, and stimulants Ritalin and Adderall. The number of prescriptions written for these drugs has doubled in the past 10 years.

The annual survey, called "Monitoring the Future," was conducted by the University of Michigan, using data on 46,000 students in grades eight to 12.

Labels: abuse, drug_use, prescription_drugs

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U.S. youth between the ages of 5 and 19 are being medicated at record levels for a variety of conditions, with young girls showing the greatest increases, according to a report by researchers associated with the University of St. Louis, the Kansas Health Institute, and Express Scripts (a pharmacy benefit management company):

• The use of medication to treat Type 2 diabetes in young girls increased by 147 percent. (Among boys in the same age group, the increase was 39 percent.)


• Prescriptions for drugs to treat Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder increased by 63 percent for adolescent girls, and 33 percent for boys.


• Among girls ages 15 to 19, antidepressant use increased by 6.8 percent. Use of similar medications among boys ages 15 to 19 decreased.

"Our study findings indicate that these increased levels of chronic medication use are symptoms of broader underlying issues affecting children today," Dr. Emily R. Cox, senior director of research at Express Scripts, said in a Nov. 3 university-issued press release.

"These trends are worrisome given that many of these therapies are treating conditions with modifiable risk factors and if not addressed, many of these children will carry these chronic conditions into adulthood," Cox said.

The study was published in the November 2008 edition of the journal Pediatrics.

Labels: medications, prescription_drugs

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