It’s a horrible thought that you might have had something to do with your kid’s drug problems and their need for drug rehab. But, in the case of prescription drug addiction or abuse, there’s a good chance that it’s true.

How could you have been responsible? According to a recent study of over 70,000 people aged 12 and up, more than 70 percent of people who abuse prescription painkillers get the drugs from friends or relatives. They usually have permission to take them and, of course, the drugs are free.

Here are more alarming statistics:

• 7 million Americans abuse pharmaceutical drugs
• The home medicine cabinet is a primary place where people get their drugs
• 55 percent of prescription painkiller abusers get drugs from a family or friends for free
• 11 percent buy them from friends or family
• 5 percent steal them from friends and family

And then there are the prescription drug overdose deaths:

• Prescription drugs cause more overdose deaths than heroin and cocaine combined.
• Prescription drugs are involved in 75 percent of all overdose deaths in the U.S.
• Three out of every four deaths from pills involve opioid painkillers like oxycodone. OxyContin addiction is widespread, but people also die from hydrocodone and methadone.

And other problems brought on by prescription drug abuse:

• Prescription drugs are often the reason for gang violence and for people starting a life of crime
• People who abuse prescription drugs become addicted then turn into drug dealers so they can make money to support their habit
• Doctors and pharmacists are also turning into drug dealers to make more money
• 25 percent of people who abuse painkillers chronically get their drugs from doctors

I think the statistics speak for themselves. Prescription drug abuse is not something to mess around with. They kill people – and that’s not something you want to be responsible for.

If you or someone else in the family is already abusing prescription drugs – or even addicted to them simply by taking them as your doctor prescribed them – it might be time to look for another solution. But, first, find a good drug rehab program that is experienced in helping people get off prescription drugs.

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In Louisville, Kentucky, a community mental health clinic that services 30,000 patients in the area is no longer going to prescribe the sedative Xanax or its generic version, alprazolam. They’re hoping this move will prevent prescription drug addiction, overdoses, deaths, and the need for drug rehab. They are also hoping to reduce the ‘constant stream of patients seeking Xanax” and the drain on resources caused by “pacifying, educating, bumping heads with people over Xanax.”

They started weaning people off the drugs in April, and plan to have all patients weaned off them completely by the end of 2011.

Xanax and alprazolam aren’t the only addictive prescription drugs causing problem in Kentucky. OxyContin addiction has been a major problem, as have other prescription painkillers like hydrocodone and methadone.

In fact, they been so busy trying to address the painkiller addiction problem that benzodiazepines like Xanax have kind of slipped through the cracks. But abuse and addiction to benzos is also widespread.

Alprazolam, for example, was the eighth most prescribed drug in the country in 2010. And there was an increase of 89% in emergency room visits.

The medical examiner in Kentucky said a combination of opiate painkillers, like OxyContin, and benzodiazepines, especially Xanax, is common in fatal overdoses.

Unfortunately, the clinic is going to replace Xanax and alprazolam with other drugs that don’t give you the ‘high’ that keep people clamoring for Xanax and alprazolam. Also, the body builds up a tolerance to Xanax and alprazolam so people have to take more and more of the drugs to get the same effect. This makes them even more prone to overdose.

Who knows where the other drugs will lead?

But, the clinic is also committed to spending more time with patients and actually working with them to relieve the anxiety they’re experiencing in life so they don’t need drugs at all.

Doctors get paid more for seeing a patient for 10 minutes and prescribing a drug than they do for actually sitting down with the patient and helping them work out the problems in their lives that are causing their emotional state. So it’s possible that their new protocol will affect their bottom line.

It’s good to see a clinic willing to take the hit in order to reduce the damage done by these dangerous and highly addictive drugs. Now, if we could just get them to stop prescribing dangerous drugs altogether …

If you or someone you know has a problem with prescription drug addiction, dependency or abuse, contact Drug Rehab Referral for help in sorting out how to get them into a drug rehab program that will enable them to live drug-free.

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If you have a son or daughter who is a musician, or aspires to be one, you might also have heard from them that drugs and alcohol get their creative juices flowing. The MusiCares MAP Fund, which has save the lives and careers of many musicians by getting them through drug rehab, dispels that idea.

Parents, family members and friends sometimes struggle for years to get the musicians in their lives into drug rehab. As long as a musician thinks their creativity depends on it, the pleas are likely to fall on deaf ears. But if they hear it from another musician – especially musicians who are undeniably successful – it might get through.

The 7th Annual MusiCares MAP Fund Benefit Concert welcomed many of those musicians, and honored Depeche Mode singer Dave Gahan. Gahan, who after years of drug abuse survived a suicide attempt and a heroin overdose, lived to pick up his career and has now been sober for years.

“To be honest,” said Gahan, “If you go down that route, drugs are going to take command over everything you’re doing anyway, and that’s been my experience anyway,” said the U.K. born vocalist. “I went through a period before I got clean where I don’t think I played a record for like two years. I just didn’t care.”

In the end, that’s what drugs can do to you. All you care about are the drugs.

Take it from the many artists who have fought their addictions and won: Steven Tyler, frontman for Aerosmith, Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards, Eric Clapton, Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page, Grace Slick – the list goes on and on.

And, you will notice, many still have illustrious careers.

But hundreds have been lost. Here’s a short list:

• Elvis Presley
• Janis Joplin
• Jimi Hendrix
• Tim Buckley
• Tim Hardin
• Alan Wilson (from Canned Heat)
• Brent Mydland and Ron McKernan (from Grateful Dead)
• Dee Dee Ramone (from The Ramones)
• Gram Parsons (from The Byrds)
• Gregory Herbert (from Blood, Sweat & Tears)
• Hillel Slovak (from Red Hot Chili Peppers)
• John Belushi (from Blues Brothers)]
• John Bonham (from Led Zeppelin)
• John Kahn (from Jerry Garcia Band)
• Jonathan Melvoin (from Smashing Pumpkins)
• Keith Moon (from The Who)
• Mike Bloomfield and Paul Butterfield (from Butterfield Blues Band)

and many, many more. If you check out the full list, just of well-known musicians, their average age when they died was 31.

Ask your musician friends if they want to risk ending their careers at the ripe old age of 31. Or would they rather still be playing to sold-out venues in their 60’s, like Steven Tyler and Eric Clapton?

Use this type of information to get your musician friends or relatives into drug or alcohol rehab. You may save their lives and careers. And, as many of the most successful musicians in the world will attest, it will also make them better musicians.

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