Aldous Huxley proposed that the dystopia of the future would be, to a great extent, dependent on a drug to numb the desires and energies of the society. The Drug he chose to name was Soma.
I would suggest that Soma is any mind or mood altering drugthat would influence a society to complacency and submission to authority. I am not much into hypnosis, or drug induced hypnotic or mood states.
http://freedomoutpost.com/2014/02/19-statistics-drugging-america-almost-crazy-believe/
Thanks for askin, I am an expert in these matters, since I was even a baby doc–my first clinical rotation as a junior medical student was taking care of drunks at the county hospital in Omaha.
They were on the lock up unit, and librium was used to prevent withdrawal and the DTs which can be life threatening, but Librium is a benzodiazapam, like valium and is not for treatment of alcohol dependence.
Although some treat alcoholics with benzos to substitute the sedating effect–it makes no sense. When I get inmates who are alcoholics i use Ativan, smooth benzo with a moderate half life–everyone uses Ativan now, generic name lorazapam. Small doses every 2 to 4 hours treats the shakes and prevents the DTs and probably the seizures of alcohol withdrawal, which occurs starting 8 to 12 hours after abstinence.
Long term benzos doesn’t cure the alchololic, just gives them an alternative crutch for anxiety.
Moreover sudden discontinuation of long term benzos puts the patient at risk for seizures.
So what’s the answer for your situation with the relative is a proper intervention and alcohol dependency treatment. the cure rate and recidivism rate for alcohol are troublesome, but if you are responsible or influential in this situation you might ask the social workers at you favorite hospital what’s the best outpatient alcohol program in town. it’s what’s between their ears that determines your chance of success and motivation may come from family situations.
Not the soundest of statistical reasoning in the article, but the general gist of it seems about right.
So John, you’re a doctor. A family member has been taking anxiety and anti-depressant meds of various kinds – and sometimes from several doctors and admits to drinking “a bottle of wine” a day – needed in the middle of the night to sleep and then in the middle of the day. Things “came to a head” in a car accident. They’ve prescribed Librium. Why do doctors generally prescribe all manner of drugs not to be taken with alcohol in response to drinking too much alcohol? And why do they just keep prescribing things that have proven to be ineffective for the problem and/or increase dependency when, if I were to do it, I’d fit the popular definition of insanity?