Inhalants

You’ve taught your children about the dangers of drugs and alcohol, and discussed strategies for resisting peer pressure and avoiding situation where they may be tempted or forced to consume dangerous substances. You monitor their behavior, ensuring that you know where they are, who they’re with, and when they’ll be home. And once they are at home, you sign contentedly and express a brief word of thanks that, finally, you can relax, because there are no drug dangers in your house.

Or so you think.

In reality, your home – and the homes of even your most safety-conscious friends, neighbors, and relatives – are chock full of substances that curious young people often attempt to misuse for recreational purposes. Because when it comes to inhalant abuse, the problem may quite literally be right under your nose.

About Inhalants

Unlike many other oft-abused substances (such as marijuana, heroin, or cocaine), inhalants are not drugs per se. Instead, the inhalant category includes many common products with legitimate household and workplace applications that are misused for their intoxicating effects. Examples include glues, solvents, spray pains, cleaning fluids, and other related products.

According to an InfoFacts document created by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), inhalants are “a diverse group of volatile substances whose chemical vapors can be inhaled to produce psychoactive (mind-altering) effects.”

The Mayo Clinic reports that inhalants are usually ingested by one of the following three means:

• Huffing – soaking a rag in an inhalant and pressing the rag to one’s mouth.
• Sniffing – breathing or snorting fumes from an aerosol container, or spraying the aerosol directly into one’s nose or mouth.
• Bagging – inhaling fumes from a product that has been sprayed or poured into a bag (usually paper, sometimes plastic).

The NIDA document lists four subcategories of inhalants:

1. Volatile solvents
   • This category is comprised of liquids that vaporize at room temperature.
   • Examples include including paint thinners or removers, degreasers, dry cleaning fluids, gasoline and lighter fluid. Other common solvents that are often abused include glues, correction fluids, and felt-tip marker fluids.
2. Aerosols
   • This category includes sprays that contain propellants and solvents.
   • Commonly abuse aerosols include spray paints, hairspray, or deodorant sprays, fabric protector sprays, some computer cleaning products, and vegetable oil sprays
3. Gases
   • Abused gases include some that are found in household products and others that are used by medical personnel as anesthetics.
   • Common household examples include butane lighters, propane tanks, whipped cream canisters, and refrigerant gases.
   • Medical anesthetics include ether, chloroform, and nitrous oxide (which is also known by the slang term “laughing gas”)
4. Nitrites
   • Substances in this subcategory are employed primarily for their ability to enhance the intensity and pleasure of sexual encounters.
   • Organic nitrites include cyclohexyl, butyl, and amyl nitrites (which are known by the slang term “poppers”).

Extent of Use

The 2007 edition of NIDA’s Monitoring the Future survey indicated that 15.6 percent of U.S. eighth graders have experimented at least once with an inhalant. This means that inhalants are the most commonly abused substances among the members of this demographic group, surpassing tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, and other commonly abused drugs.

Among older youth, inhalants were found to have been used at least once by 13.6 percent of high school sophomores and 10.5 percent of high school juniors.

The Monitoring the Future findings were consistent with the information that was uncovered during the National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), which found that inhalants are most popular among individuals between the ages of 12 and 17. More than 77 percent of people who tried inhalants for the first time in the past year were under the age of 18.

For young adults between 18 and 25, NSDUH reported that past-year use of inhalants is on the decline (2.1 percent in 2005; 1.8 percent in 2006).

Health Hazards

Inhalant abuse can result in significant short-term and long-term damage, and the behavior can be fatal.

The intoxicating effects of inhalants usually last no more than a few minutes – but some users attempt to extend the experience by continuing to breathe in the substances over and over again. This can lead to a range of effects including disorientation, diminished inhibitions, impaired judgment, and unconsciousness.

Inhaling highly concentrated amounts of the chemicals in solvents or aerosol sprays can result in heart failure and death within minutes of exposure – even in otherwise healthy first-time users. According to the website of the National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign (NYADMC), this type of sudden death sniffing death is particularly associated with the abuse of butane, propane, and chemicals in aerosols.

Additional damage related to inhalant abuse includes the following:

• Asphyxiation or suffocation
• Blood oxygen depletion
• Brain damage
• Depression
• Liver and kidney damage
• Vision and hearing impairments

Treatment

According to an article by Dr. Carrie E. Anderson and Dr. Glenn A. Loomis that appeared in the Sept. 1, 2003, edition of the journal American Family Physician, the most effective treatment programs for individuals who have been abusing inhalants involve “counseling, strict abstinence by the abuser, and other drug dependency protocols. … Currently, no specific agents can reverse acute solvent intoxication. In addition, no medications have proved helpful in the treatment of inhalant withdrawal or dependence.”

Depending upon the degree to which a person has been abusing inhalants, treatment may be completed on an outpatient basis, while hospitalized, or in a residential facility.