Addiction to drugs and alcohol is a primary, chronic disease
with
genetic, psychosocial, and environmental factors influencing its development and manifestations. The disease is often progressive and fatal. It is characterized by continuous or periodic: impaired control over drinking/drugging, preoccupation with the drugs/alcohol, use of alcohol/drugs despite adverse consequences, and distortions in thinking, most notably denial."
"Primary" refers to the nature of drug addiction / alcoholism as a disease entity in addition to and separate from other pathophysiologic states which may be associated with it.
"Primary" suggests that drug addiction/alcoholism, as an addiction, is not a symptom of an underlying disease state.
"Disease" means an involuntary disability. It represents the sum of the abnormal phenomena displayed by a group ofindividuals. These phenomena are associated with a specified common set of characteristics by which these individuals differ from the norm, andwhich places them at a disadvantage.
"Often progressive and fatal" means that the disease persists over time and that physical, emotional, and social changes are often cumulative and may progress as drinking/drugging continues. Alcoholism/drug addiction causes premature death through overdose, organic complications involving the brain, liver, heart and many other organs, and by contributing to suicide, homicide, motor vehicle crashes, and other traumatic events.
"Impaired control" means the inability to limit drug or alcohol use or to consistently limit on any drinking/drugging occasion the duration of the episode, the quantity consumed, and/or the behavioral consequences of drugging/drinking.
"Preoccupation" in association with drugs/alcohol use indicates excessive, focused attention given to the drug or alcohol, its effects,and/or its use. The relative value thus assigned to drugs/alcohol by the individual often leads to a diversion of energies away from important life concerns.
"Adverse consequences" are drug or alcohol-related problems or impairments in such areas as: physical health (e.g., drug/alcohol withdrawal syndromes, liver disease, gastritis, anemia, neurological disorders); psychological functioning (e.g., impairments in cognition,changes in mood and behavior); interpersonal functioning (e.g., marital problems and child abuse, impaired social relationships); occupational functioning (e.g., scholastic or job problems); and legal, financial,or spiritual problems.
"Denial" is used here not only in the psychoanalytic sense of a single psychological defense mechanism disavowing the significance of events, but more broadly to include a range of psychological maneuvers designed to reduce awareness of the fact that drug or alcohol use is the cause of an individual's problems rather than asolution to those problems. Denial becomes an integral part of the disease and a major obstacle to recovery.
