Putting drug abuse research to use in real-life settings.

Drug abuse and addiction are among the most serious and costly problems facing society today. Drug abuse and addiction are also among this nation’s most widely misunderstood problems. Despite all scientific progress, many people still view addiction as simply a moral or character problem, rather than the disease that it is. In addition, there remains a tremendous amount of stigma attached to this disease, which not only interferes with the individual patient’s ability to get needed help, but also overlays all policy and practice aspects of the issue. Fortunately, there is now available a tremendous body of scientific information about drug addiction and its treatment to counter those ideologies and help inform policies and practices.

This brief paper discusses drug abuse as a brain disease, ways of improving the quality of drug addiction treatment, current Clinical Trials Network research, and the formation of true partnerships between researchers and practitioners.