Babies Born Addicted to Pain Killers

It is obviously well known in today’s world that prescription drugs have the potential to be dangerously addictive and damaging to your mental and physical health. Prescription pain killers are a problem in nearly every community in America, but the drug epidemic is reaching the next generation through mothers who use the drugs during pregnancy. In this day and age it’s common knowledge that drinking alcohol, smoking cigarettes, or doing any kind of drugs during pregnancy results in an unhealthier child—but whether or not taking prescription pain killers would have the same effect has been generally unclear and not often discussed. Unfortunately babies born addicted to prescription drugs is as bad of a problem as adults being addicted to them.

Any kind of narcotics that are routinely used during pregnancy will pass through to the baby—and once the baby is born, it no longer will have access to these drugs which will lead to the baby experiencing withdrawal symptoms upon birth. Babies today are increasingly being born with neonatal abstinence syndrome (NAS), the withdrawal process, because of the increased amount of mothers that are addicted to prescription opioids like oxycodone. It’s a serious problem today that has resulted in a sharp increase of babies being transferred to the intensive care unit after birth. It’s extremely important for expecting mothers to know the consequences of their actions, and a woman who is addicted to prescription pain killers should not try to have a baby or should obviously not continue taking the drugs during pregnancy.

It’s unfortunately very common for people to become addicted to prescription painkillers today, but thankfully there’s excellent rehabilitation treatment available to battle these tough painkiller addictions. Individuals who abuse or are addicted to prescription medications can be treated. Initially, they may need to undergo medically supervised detoxification to help reduce withdrawal symptoms—however that is just the first step. Options for effectively treating addiction to prescription pills are drawn from research on treating heroin addiction. Behavioral treatments combined with medications have proven effective. Finding the right treatment center can make all the difference for a patient because certain standard programs may not work. At Seabrook, patients can take comfort in knowing that we structure individually inspired detox and rehab programs in order to fit the needs of each unique patient. Seabrook has rehab facilities located in New Jersey (NJ) and Pennsylvania (PA) and also an outpatient office in New York (NY). If you or a loved one is abusing prescription medications then be sure to contact Seabrook immediately for the treatment to get on the road to recovery.