Since the 19th century, opium has been produced and consumed in the areas of Asia, currently referred to as the Golden Crescent and the Golden Triangle (1). The Golden Crescent lies in South and Southwest Asia, including districts in the Northwest Frontier Province of Pakistan, the adjacent Badakhshan area of Afghanistan and the Baluchistan area of Iran. The area has been the scene of tradition...

AIM To compare adolescent heroin addicts and non-addicts with respect to their perceived parental acceptance and rejection, family factors (structure of the family, parents' marital status, and psychopathological disorders in the family), socio-economic status, and subjective appraisal of their family relations. METHODS Fifty-two heroin addicts aged between 17 and 21, were compared with a gro...

BACKGROUND Myocardial infarction (MI) is a heart condition caused by the suspension of blood circulation in a part of the myocardium. There are different risk factors contributing to a heart attack. Some believe that endorphins and endogenous opioids play an important role in causing MIs. OBJECTIVES This study intended to determine the relationship between opium dependency and mortality rate ...

BACKGROUND Due to this belief that opium may have beneficial effects on diabetes or cardiovascular risk factors, the present study aimed to assess the potential and possible effects of opium consumption on diabetes control and some cardiovascular risk factors in diabetic patients. METHODS This study enrolled 374 diabetic subjects from diabetes care centers in Kerman, Iran, including opium use...

BACKGROUND Postoperative cognitive dysfunction, especially delirium commonly occurs after cardiac surgery. Clinical evidences suggest an increase in delirium in opium abusers after Coronary Artery Bypass Graft (CABG) surgery. In this study, the prevalence of delirium in addict (opium user) and nonaddict patients after CABG were compared. METHODS In a cross-sectional study after obtaining inst...

Objective To describe an outbreak of lead poisoning among opium users in the Islamic Republic of Iran and estimate the number of affected people in the country. Methods We used data from the country's largest poison treatment centre to illustrate the epidemiology of an outbreak of lead poisoning in oral opium users. We describe the government's referral and treatment guidelines in response to...

Opium consumption is increasing in some eastern societies, where it is grown. We investigated the effect of opium smoking on plasma atherogenic index and incidence of lethal cardiac arrhythmia, i.e. ventricular tachycardia (VT) and ventricular fibrillation (VF) in rabbits. Animals were divided into two-, normo- and hyper-cholesterolemic main groups fed with normal or high cholesterol diet prior...

The importance of opium as a cash crop among the Hmong 1 in north Thailand is widely known and has been studied in detaii.2 The association between the Hmong and Yunnanese "Haw" traders, through whom the Hmong have traditionally marketed opium, is also well known. It is a common misconception, however, that opium plays a central role in Hmong culture. It has, for example, apparently little or n...

Article type: Short communication Objective(s): The aim of this study was to determine the important molecules involved in apoptosis induction by opium in Jurkat cell line. Materials and Methods: Jurkat cells were incubated 48 hrs with 2.86×10-5 g/ml concentration of opium and apoptosis as well as expression levels of related molecules were measured. Results: Our results demonstrated that 50.3±...

BACKGROUND Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer-related death worldwide, and half of all incident lung cancers are believed to occur in the developing countries, including Iran. OBJECTIVE We investigated the association of opium with the risk of lung cancer in a case-control study. METHODS We enrolled 242 cases and 484 matched controls in this study. A questionnaire was developed, con...