An article written by a group of students at the University of Rhode Island (URI) highlights how "advances in technology" encourage the use of dangerous or illicit substances among teenagers without their parents or guardians even noticing. According to Sarah Feldstein Ewing, a professor at the Prochaska Foundation:
What is so different today compared to past generations is that parents and health care providers could rely on what we traditionally considered obvious signs to know if children were using. Did they come home smelling of cigarettes or cannabis? Do they have alcohol breath? (...) Although some of these things still work, the problem today is that, increasingly, the substances that children use are not so easy to detect. And the signs are not as obvious as they used to be.
Invisible symptoms
The study is called The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health and was conducted under Feldstein's direction. It shows how "in the last decade there has been a global increase in the use of e-cigarettes, cannabis and prescription opiates” due in large part to "new methods" of administration, such as the use of "new cannabis-based edibles and vapes”:
These substances have "invisible symptoms" to adults and, in turn, can be much more difficult for parents and health professionals to detect (...) Because of this, young people are more likely to move from experimentation to more intense and dangerous use, which goes undetected until there is a substantial impact on school, work, or their personal or family relationships.
Feldstein, who is also director of URI's Neuroscience Center for Adolescent Health Resilience, is particularly concerned that teenagers are increasingly consuming these harmful substances. Since their "adolescent brains” are still developing, these drugs could "adversely affect long-term neural and behavioral development."
Although research is ongoing into how these substances affect the brain, there is evidence to suggest that their use during adolescence may negatively affect long-term neural and behavioral development.
"Families would come to me for treatment of young people who were using large amounts of substances and they would say, 'I didn't even know my son was using.’ Parents are having a hard time and now that many states are legalizing cannabis for recreational use, I think parents and providers are really at a loss when it comes to addressing this issue," Feldstein said.
An "old-fashioned conversation" and a "reset"
Although the report is aimed primarily at adolescent health care providers, the director says parents and caregivers should "open the lines of communication with young people." She believes this to be one of the best ways of “helping to stop substance use" even though it is an "old-fashioned conversation."
It is certainly difficult today: families are busy with work, school, sports and other activities. But the point is, if that can be a place where you are seeing and connecting with your children every day, it will be easier to notice small changes in behavior or other patterns.
The doctor pointed out a "readjustment" to the new reality and offers encouragement to parents, who, in her opinion, "still have the greatest influence on their children's behavior," even though they spend most of their time with their friends:
The most important thing about all of this is that this is new territory, and that's fine (...) The things we've done historically no longer translate well for these new forms of substances, so we have to readjust.
But when it comes down to it, even though we tend to think that teenagers spend most of their time with their friends, parents still have the greatest influence on their children's behavior, they must be willing to have conversations, even if they are sometimes scary.
"The current problem is that the substances that children use are not as easy to detect." E-cigarettes, cannabis edibles and prescription opiates are among the "new methods" of administration that are increasing drug use.
