According to a new study published on Monday Jama Pediatrics. Studies have found that a large number of children’s addiction is moderate or severe rather than mild parents.

One in four children of an addicted parent.

"I'm an addiction document, so I've been thinking about this all the time," said Dr. Scott Hadland, director of teenage medical at Massachusetts General Hospital. "Even so, I'm still surprised at how high that percentage feels. This is just a large number of children affected. ”

“If one in four parents in the U.S. have parents with drug use disorders, it tells us that in clinics we encounter many families affected by drug use disorders every day, not even dozens of families,” he added. “And we need to be ready and ready to help those families.”

The new study uses data from the 2023 National Drug Use and Health Survey, a federal survey that estimates the prevalence of substance use and mental health disorders based on the latest updated standards Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders-V (DSM-5). The national survey is managed by the Administration of Drug Abuse and Mental Health Services, but the team responsible for the survey is part of the recent effective reduction. It is unclear how the cuts will affect the future of the investigation.

The main findings of this study are significantly higher than previous estimates (7 million in the 2022 study), which relies on diagnostic criteria for DSM-4.

The new study also estimates how many children have moderate or severe addiction parents, rather than mild.

"We also found that 7.6 million children live in a family of parents with moderate or severe drug use disorders," said Sean Esteban McCabe, director of the Center for Drugs, Alcohol, Smoking and Health Research at the University of Michigan. "With 3.4 million parents living with parents with multiple drug use disorders."

McCabe and his team also found that in addition to drug use disorders, more than 6 million children have a parent with a mental health condition.

"These estimates are important to understand the scope of drug use disorders in parents in the United States," Dr. Davida Schiff, a pediatrician and addiction medicine physician at Massachusetts General Hospital, was not involved in the new study.

Another noteworthy finding in this study, Schiff believes, is that most parents (12 million) suffer from alcohol-drinking disorders. “Although alcohol is more acceptable in our society, research suggests that more attention is needed to be paid to the increase in the number of children exposed to parental alcohol drinking disorder.”

"Also remember that alcohol is actually the main cause of substance-related deaths in the United States," Hadland noted. "In fact, it kills more people in the United States than every year, but it's a slower mortality rate. It's a chronic disease process that affects someone's liver and is a risk for someone to develop cancer."

Children of addicted parents are themselves at a higher risk for various physical and mental health problems.

"Toddlers who grew up in families affected by parental SUD (drug use disorder) suffer from impaired care, disruption of parental competence, unintentional intake and witnessing the risk of parental overdose," Schiff wrote.

They also face higher risks In the long run, develop certain mental health conditions and medication use issues.

“One of the things I’m doing when I care for a young man with a parent with medication use disorder is to make sure I do a good job asking and screening for mental health issues like depression, anxiety, ADHD, and we know that all of this is more common among the children of addicted parents,” Hadland said.

The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that pediatricians ask patients and/or parents about substance use in their families to educate them about the risks of drug use and to connect the family to the family if needed.

“We as pediatricians and family medicine physicians may consider screening for drug use and drug disorders when parents enter the clinic to help ensure we can identify problems and connect parents with treatment because it may be in the best interest of the child,” Hadland said.

Schiff wrote that the Boston-area BBYU pediatric clinic used a developmental screening that included questions about the purpose of parents.

She said that addicted parents love their children and want the best, but cannot get treatment due to the disorders seeking addiction and disorders.

For parents with medication use disorders, Schiff said she and her colleagues “discuss the determination to provide children with safe and sober caregivers during active use and train them in naloxone management if unconscious intake occurs.”

As for parents with infant addiction, she recommends avoiding breastfeeding after using substances and discussing safe sleep habits “to prevent unsafe sleep damage and baby choking.”

“We know that three-quarters of drug use disorders are not treated,” McCabe said. “There are much less likely to get help on their own with children with unhelpful parents. So I think it’s important for us to serve and provide care for our children to understand what these numbers mean and how we design plans to meet these kids.”