What damage to the brain does drugs cause?

These are the main harmful effects that drug use has on the brain.

Drugs are psychoactive substances with a high potential to damage us both inside and out.

Their habitual use drags us into a lifestyle in which we lose control of our own lives, and at the same time, the molecules they contain, capable of entering our brain by bypassing the protective cellular barriers that surround it, cause our way of thinking, feeling and behaving to undergo a radical change, physically altering the body's own nervous system.

In this article we will focus on this last aspect of drugs: how they interact with our body and cause damage to the brain.. Damage that in many cases takes a long time to reverse or never completely disappears, especially without therapeutic support.

The main damages that drug use produces in the brain.

Each type of drug has its own mechanics of functioning once it has come into contact with our neurons. However, in general there are a series of neuropsychological phenomena that almost all substance addictions have in common, and which are reflected in changes in the brain of the user.

These are the different ways in which drug use generates in the brain of those who have developed or are developing an addiction.

1. Increased rate of cell death in the brain

When taken frequently or after large doses and abuse, many drugs cause nerve cells to die in greater numbers than would be normal..

This has to do with the changes in the functioning of the nervous system induced by the entry of the psychoactive substance (the brain has not evolved to cope with the usual presence of that amount of molecules introduced from the outside) as well as the unhealthy lifestyle that goes parallel to drug use.

2. Hyperexcitability in the abstinence syndrome

In people who have already developed an addiction to drugs, spending many hours at a time without using generates a withdrawal syndrome: physical and psychological discomfort, on the one hand, and the feeling of needing to use as soon as possible, on the other. At the neuropsychological level, this implies that the cerebral cortex enters a state of hyperexcitability, given that "alarms go off" in the body and the immediate search for consumption is prioritized.

This implies that anxiety and stress appear, and sensitivity to stimuli that in other situations would have gone unnoticed appearsThe person reacts more intensely to any change or potentially relevant signal detected in his environment.

On the other hand, in some cases, the modifications that the brain has undergone due to drug use are so profound that the simple fact of suddenly stopping the consumption of that substance means that there is a risk of suffering additional medical problems, or even of losing one's life. For this reason, in some treatments for drug addicts, substitute drugs (often methadone) are used to facilitate the gradual cessation of drug use.

In any case, these processes must always be supervised by medical personnel who have studied the patient's problem individually and prescribed the use of the substitution substance, since the latter is also potentially dangerous.

3. Fluctuations in the levels of neurotransmitters available in the brain

In drug addiction, the brain becomes accustomed to functioning "by default" on the assumption that the psychoactive substance is present in its neuronal networks.. However, this does not mean that it is well adapted to this way of functioning.

As the amount and type of molecules in the nervous system change abruptly (in a matter of seconds or a few minutes) during drug use, the brain undergoes constant fluctuations and finds it difficult to adapt to this rhythm.

For example, when consuming cocaine, the neurons of our brain are surrounded by dopamine in less than five minutes; however, ten minutes later, the amount of this substance that is available to our nerve cells plummets, and the brain goes from a state of high activation to a state of nervous inhibition and almost depression. These rapid changes give rise to chain reactions that affect us on many levels: impairing our ability to concentrate, affecting us negatively on an emotional level, etc.

4. Structural changes in brain wiring that predispose to habituation.

In the medium and long term, drug addiction leads to the phenomenon of habituation: the person who started using drugs, often under the misconception that he or she was always in control of his or her pattern of drug use, needs to use more and more frequently to experience the same effects and to keep the withdrawal syndrome at bay..

This is partly because over time, neurons are weaving interconnections with each other by adapting to a context in which the drug is usually available in the body, while doing so on the principle that using more is the main purpose of everything that happens in the brain.

What to do to avoid these problems?

As you have been able to see, and with few exceptions in products such as those containing caffeine, the consumption of drugs is always accompanied by very harmful effects for the body and that occur from the first intake.

However, we should not only focus on the changes for the worse that these substances generate in the brain; they also give rise to other very serious problems that are beyond the nervous system.. For example, the deterioration of personal relationships, the inability to cope with responsibilities, and even endangering others: for example, alcohol abuse is even more risky for those around the person with alcoholism than for the person with alcoholism, according to several studies.

This is why, at the first signs of drug addiction, it is necessary to seek professional help as soon as possible.. Through psychological and medical treatment, it is possible to intervene both in the dysfunctional dynamics of the brain and in the behavioral dynamics of the addicted person, allowing him/her to break out of the vicious circle of consumption and giving him/her resources to prevent relapses.

Looking for therapeutic support for addictions?

If you are looking for addiction treatment, contact us. At CITA Clinics you will find both an interdisciplinary team of medical and psychotherapy professionals, as well as fully equipped facilities for therapy sessions and for admissions in our residential module, located in a natural environment and full of available activities.

Bibliographical references:

• Kalivas, P.W.; Volkow, N.D. (2005): The neural basis of addiction: a pathology of motivation and choice. The American Journal of Psychiatry. 162(8): pp. 1403 - 1413.
• Nutt, D.J.; King, L.A.; Phillips, L.D. (2010): Drug harms in the UK: a multicriteria decision analysis. The Lancet, 376(9752): pp. 1558 - 1565.