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"This second edition of Salem Health: Addictions, Substance Abuse & Alcoholism presents essays on a variety of topics concerning substance abuse and behavioral addictions and their related issues. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report that more Americans die from the effects of drug abuse than from traffic accidents, and attributes the death of nearly 100,000 Americans annually to the excessive consumption of alcohol. These startling statistics, coupled with the staggering rise in deaths from prescription drug misuse in the twenty-first century, have thrown the spotlight on how the allied health community and society at large approach, track, and treat alcohol and drug dependency and other addictive behaviors. As addictions and their related disorders continue to escalate, so has society's understanding and treatment of them, from increased and more thorough comprehension of maladaptive behavior to a clearer picture of the physiological effects of substance abuse, both in the short and long term. Also important is being aware of the role that substance abuse and misuse and addiction play in society, whether through glorification or stigmatization in the media, or experienced firsthand in a home or social setting by a parent or child, and the agencies and preventative strategies in place to curb abuse and its effects. Salem Health: Addictions, Substance Abuse & Alcoholism surveys the decades of progress in understanding and treating addictive behaviors and substance abuse, analyzing trends and treatment, offering historical and technical background, and providing socioeconomic, psychological, and physiological understanding of the influence and impact of addiction and substance abuse." -- Publisher's description