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clinician. But before meeting with a clinician, the patient must return a packet of information to CAPS that includes a self-report, a survey with someone who currently knows the person well and information about the patient's formative years provided by the parents. CAPS also requires elementary, middle and high school transcripts.The rest of the process includes a personality assessment test and clinical evaluations.
At Watkins Health Center students who want to get an old stimulant prescription renewed, or who bring in a diagnosis and wants a new prescription entirely, must provide proof of a full evaluation, Dr. Myra Strother says.
"She would give me handfuls," Sarah remembers.
"If I see a student who comes in with just a prescription from a family doctor, I will not give them medication." *Strother says.*
Amber, Overland Park sophomore, took Adderall she got from friends occasionally her first semester at the University as well. But before the start of her second semester, she was tested for and diagnosed with ADHD. According to her prescription, Amber is supposed to take one 30-milligram pill every morning and one 20-milligram pill every afternoon. Because the severity of ADHD varies from person to person each ADHD patient's prescription is different.
For those students looking for a study stimulant who don't want to go through the process of getting a prescription, there is always another way, as in Sarah's case. Her roommate, who was diagnosed with ADHD and had prescriptions for Ritalin and Adderall was generous with her medication and rarely took all of her prescribed amount (Which Hinshaw says is quite normal for ADHD patients).
Amber says she doesn't usually take her prescribed dosage and never uses her entire prescription in one month. She usually gives about 10 pills to friends every month, and sometimes sells them as well. Selling, though, is a rarity. Amber says $5 is the most she's ever made on one pill, and she's only made about $30 altogether since she started filling her prescription.
To Amber, giving away medication is simply a way of helping out her friends. To the federal government, however, it's a felony. Because Adderall is an amphetamine, it is in the same regulatory category as cocaine and selling it is a class B felony, the same as distributing methamphetamine.In April 2005,a University of
HOW AMPHETAMINES WORK
When you are stressed or threatened, your body reacts with the "fight-or-flight" response; physical changes that prime your body for an emergency situation. Amphhetinines artificially produce the fight-or-flight response. Glands release adrenaline and other stress hormones into your bloodstream. Your heart rate and blood pressure increase. Blood flow is directed from your abdomen to your muscles.
BRAIN SPECT IMAGING, INC. AND WWW.TVKU.EDU
Source: betterhealth.vic.gov
Oregon student was arrested for selling legally obtained Adderall and dextroamphetamine sulfate out of his dorm room.
A Prescription Drug World
Sarah's first experience with stimulants was in eighth grade, when a friend with ADHD who didn't like to take all her medication gave
Sarah Adderall to get rid of the extra pills in her bottle. After that, Sarah continued to take Adderall occasionally throughout high school. Once she got to the University and realized her roommate had excess Concerta, Sarah would occasionally ask for some pills. Throughout her first year at the University, Sarah would sometimes take Concerta as often as every other day, sometimes as infrequently as every other week.
Sarah's habits are part of a growing trend of prescription
drug abuse nationwide. In 2003, the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse reported that 15.1 million Americans abused prescription drugs, up from 7.8 million in 1992. The three-year study also found that from 1992 to 2003, prescription drug abuse grew two times faster than the rate of marijuana abuse, five times faster than cocaine abuse and 60 times faster than heroin abuse.
The Center also performed a search for Web sites where a person can buy prescription medication without actually having a prescription. In a one-week window the study found 495 sites advertising prescription drug sales. Only six percent of the sites required a prescription to purchase medication, meaning
anyone with a credit card and a mailing address has access to drugs like Adderall, Concerta, OxyContin and Xanax, among others.
"I've had people come and tell me that before they came to see me they got Ritalin online from Pakistan and Valium online from Mexico," Romerime says. "People don't even think it's dangerous, I think it's very foolish, I
The goal for treating people with ADHD is not to make them super-human, it's to make them normal. Mark Romereim
think it is an ignorance issue."
The Adderall Advantage
But why go to all this trouble in the first place? Does it really improve your grades that much? Sarah says in certain subjects, such as math, stimulants made a difference. In others, she couldn't really tell. Out of 28 students surveyed informally in a math class, 13 said they have used a prescription stimulant without a prescription, 11 said they had not and five said they used it
with a prescription.
Of the 13 who had taken a stimulant without a prescription,eight said they thought it helped them get better grades and five said it didn't make a difference.
Amber says at least 30, maybe more, of her friends use Adderall. She agrees with Sarah that taking it with or without a prescription is only dangerous if you take too much. Amber says she once took 60-milligrams to study for a big test and the dosage caused her to throw up. She says she has seen the same effect in others who have taken too much.
Sarah says that when she took Concerta she often wouldn't sleep for 48 hours or eat for a day and a half. But Sarah says the negative side
The brain of a person diagnosed with ADD shows considerably more activity when Adderall is taken than when it is not. These images were taken while the person was doing an activity that required concentration.
effects were worth the hours of concentration one Concerta pill could provide.
Amber says stimulants definitely helped her — her GPA went from 2.38 her first semester before being diagnosed with ADHD to 2.88 after she began taking Adderall to help her focus.
Ultimately, students like Sarah will keep the stimulant trend alive. She doesn't have a problem taking them, and hasn't taken them this year simply because they aren't as readily available to her now. She doesn't think there is any real danger in using stimulants as a study aide, an opinion Romereim does not share.
"it's cheating in the same way that when I was in college, kids took speed, or it's like taking caffeine to stay alert." Romereim says "it's illegal and dangerous, but it's not on the level of plagiarism.
"The goal for treating people with ADHD is not to make them superhuman, it's meant to make them normal," he says. "For people who don't have ADHD, (the drugs are) being used very improperly."
For Amber, the use is clearly justified. But are those who don't really need stimulants, like Sarah, and take them just to get ahead cheating?
According to a nationwide survey of about 11,000 college students published in the January 2005 issue of the journal Addiction, colleges with higher admission standards have the highest rate of prescription drug abuse up to 25 percent.
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