When confronting the power of addiction, the power of language is important to keep in mind, specialists say.
“The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the American Psychiatric Association’s diagnostic handbook, describes someone struggling with addiction as having “opioid use disorder.” But many of us are more familiar with “drug abuser,” as well as the term’s negative connotations.
“It’s so hard for people to give up the ‘abuse’ word,” said Sarah Wakeman, medical director of the Substance Use Disorders Initiative and the Addiction Consult Team at Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), during an interview at her office.
The terms “abuse” and “abuser,” she wrote in an article published last year by the American Society of Addiction Medicine, “imply a willful misconduct and have been shown to increase stigma and reduce the quality of care.” Equally harmful, she added, is the language often applied to the most effective form of treatment.”
Read more at: https://medicalxpress.com/news/2017-08-language-addiction.html
Source: MedicalXpress.com – August 29, 2017
