Rodney: My guest is Dr. Arturo Taca of INSynergy from Creve Coeur up in St. Louis, Missouri. I’d like to welcome you to the show, Dr. Taca.

Dr. Taca: Thank you, Dr. Gross. I feel privileged being able to be part of your show.

Rodney: Oh thank you. Please call me Rodney.

Dr. Taca: Okay, Rodney.

Rodney: We’re doing this a little different today. We have a captive audience, so we’d like to welcome the audience and feel free to pass questions along and we’ll try to answer them in one of the next segments.

Dr. Taca: Great.

Rodney: But we want to get right to you, Dr. Taca. You are a Diplomat of the American Board of Addiction Medicine, American Board of Psychiatry, and American Board of Neurology.

Dr. Taca: That’s right. Our field of addiction medicine is growing by leaps and bounds.

Rodney: That’s a broad field, Dr. Taca. A lot of people are just used to seeing their family doctor and some of the specialists they refer them to, so it excites me, as a person in health corps, to see all of these board certifications.

Dr. Taca: Actually, that’s true and I’m very pleased that the science of addiction medicine is getting more respected. There are ten new addiction medicine programs that are going to be put in place around the country, which tells me that the field is growing and becoming more respected as an independent medical field.

Rodney: That’s great. Diving right into it, Dr. Taca, why the name INSynergy?

Dr. Taca: Well, as the name suggests, there’s synergistic forces that are involved in addictive behavior. We’ve always known in the past that addictive behaviors, or addiction, have run in families. There are a lot of things that contribute to addictive behavior, including the force of genetics, the role of psychiatric and psychological conditions such as depression, bipolar depression, and ADHD. A lot of these things increase the risk for impulsive behaviors and addictive behaviors. There are a lot of things that contribute to the act of being addicted. It’s not just one thing that causes someone to be addicted to alcohol. It may be that one has an exaggerated effect from drinking that may not allow someone to stop as easy as compared to me. I actually have, there’s a gene that does not allow me to become addicted to alcohol. 30% of the Asian population will lack an enzyme called alcohol dehydrenates which breaks down alcohol. So for example, when I drink it’s not very pleasurable. I sweat, I have complications, my face gets very bright red, and it’s not very pleasurable. So that’s how, at least in my case and people who lack this enzyme, are protected from, at least the alcohol illness.

Rodney: Here at RSVP Health we want to thank you for being in the current publication, the RSVP Health publication, and one of your quotes in the current issue, you were quoted saying, ‘Addiction is a mental illness.’

Dr. Taca: Well, it’s a medical illness.

Rodney: I’m sorry. I stand corrected, medical illness, you are correct.

Dr. Taca: Which may include a mental illness. We think an addiction is all in the brain and that’s what we target with all the research because we’re having a better understanding of the circuitries in the brain, what receptors are involved, and what receptors can be blocked to reduce the euphoric effect of certain drugs. So it is very biological and very scientific. As time goes by, we’re understanding the circuits a little more clearly that allows us to really treat people that haven’t traditionally been able to get sober.

Rodney: By saying that, you and I both know that wasn’t always the case as seeing addiction as a medical illness. In the past it wasn’t always viewed that way.

Dr. Taca: Well, that’s right. I think we always heard is alcohol a medical problem? Even the doctors would say yes, it’s very medical. Then when the patients would ask them to be treated medically, we didn’t have very many medical options. So even though the language was there, we didn’t really know how to approach it medically.

Rodney: At In Synergy, your treatments are on an outpatient basis. Is that correct?

Dr. Taca: That’s right.

Rodney: Reading over your material, it seems like you bullet several things: the convenience, the privacy factor, the non-disrupting one’s personal life, the cost effectiveness, etc. Could you elaborate on some of those bullets?

Dr. Taca: Yes, of course. Traditionally, when somebody wanted to get treatment for alcohol or drugs, the choices were you had to go somewhere for 28 days and disappear. You had to go inpatient. You had to be detoxed in a hospital. We now understand that with new advancements and new discoveries to addiction medicine, all of those could be achieved as an outpatient. We do it on a daily basis. The people we treat have very busy lives. They may be addicted to alcohol or opiates, pain pills, even heroin. We can safely detox each one of those addictions as an outpatient if everything is in place. Now, if my staff determines that they inquire inpatient, then we would recommend the appropriate medical treatment options. However, most people could be safely treated as an outpatient. No one has to know. It’s very confidential. There’s minimal disruption. That’s why we’re having such success with our treatment program.

Rodney: Everyone is going to want to know out there, including myself, what drives Dr. Taca? What drives you? Why this field? Why this vision?

Dr. Taca: Well I don’t know if there’s anybody who’s protected from having a friend or a close family member who’s personally struggling with drugs and alcohol. My personal friends growing up, many of my family members, uncles, and aunts, and grandfathers; everybody has this disease. So I would like to say, the people around me are who are driving my desire. But what really fascinates me is the growth of the field. When I get somebody who comes to me with a story of several failed treatment rehabs, spending dozens of thousands of dollars with these inpatient rehabs that keep them sober for a little bit. Then when they come into our clinic and after our sixth month program, the family comes to me and they say they’ve never seen so much improvement in the client’s quality of life. Their relationships are better; they’re functioning at a higher level. Sometimes they don’t even talk about their sobriety because their sobriety will come, it’s the other stuff that improves: their relationships, their functioning, and that’s what keeps me going. These people get better. There is hope; I see it on a daily basis. I don’t promise a cure like a lot of people will do. They promise a cure for this or that, and we know in the field that there is no cure for drinking or drugs. However, there are fantastic medications that eliminate, in a lot of cases, the craving that is really the biggest problem that these people are struggling with. It’s the craving of using or drinking. At least now we have better tools and better medications and we have a better approach of looking at this.

Rodney: I think you’re so right on, and I think, there again, quoting some of your sayings from your website and things like that, the future of addiction medicine, I think you’ve hit it right on the head. It’s eliminating the cravings instead of just trying to nail down an absolute cure, if that makes sense. It’s like you said. Is that the future of addiction medicine, instead of trying to do the hard cure?

Dr. Taca: Yeah well, the future is now we’re seeing we’re eliminating cravings on a daily basis. We have great medications such as Naltrexone and Vivitrol, which is an injection of Naltrexone. Things for heroin like Suboxone and Buprenorphine that are FDA approved to eliminate the cravings for alcohol and opiates. So, I’d like to refer to the future as being right now, but the future is very exciting for the field. There are things in research that for example, in the next few years their thinking that there may be a vaccine for cocaine. That will be exciting because right now there’s nothing FDA approved for treatment of cocaine. There’s a lot of literature that points to certain compounds. There are a lot of things that have been used like antidepressants or mood stabilizers, even stimulants. But right now there is nothing for the treatment of cocaine. So this vaccine, I’m keeping a close eye on it because it can be something special in the next couple years.

Rodney: You’re correct. That is very exciting. On addiction, what’s some of the common forms and types of addiction that you see at your practice?

Dr. Taca: Well, we see about 95% of the people who come for treatment are split right down the middle with alcohol and opiates. The opiates are kind of divided into pain pills and heroin. Heroin has become a middle class drug. If parents are listening, I’d like to reach out to you and warn you that heroin is like the pot of when I was growing up. New government data shows that more teenagers are using opiates for the first time as their gateway drug rather than marijuana. That’s disturbing because the opiate has the potential to get somebody quickly addicted. Within six months, they could be addicted to opiate pain pills and then the script quickly goes from pain pills to heroin. Heroin now is different from heroin when I was growing up in the 80’s. It’s not dirty back heroin that we thought that only bums would use, but it’s called China white and its powder. They can snort it, they can smoke it, they can inhale it, and when they quickly get addicted to it, they end up injecting it. This can happen quickly. So I want to warn this is an epidemic and prescription drug abuse is growing to a point where it’s becoming a nationwide problem.

Rodney: With prescription drug abuse, we see this all the time. We see it on the news; we see it in our medical correspondence. Is it the pharmacies? Is it some of the doctors writing too much medicine? Is it the people becoming too dependent? Where do you think the problem is there?

Dr. Taca: I think it’s everybody’s fault. I mean, the patients who go to the doctors wanting instant relief, there are pain specialists who believe that no one deserves to be in any type of pain. They do great work with great medications, however, a lot of people will get addicted to these medications. We have good doctors trying to practice good medicine, however, sometimes the addictive potential of some of these powerful pain medications can override that and sometimes it’s a recipe for disaster. You mix these pain medications with your typical Benzodiazepines, there’s a lot of problems with Benzos in and of themselves, Xanax or Alprazolam is one of the most prescribed drugs in all of medicine. If you mix those two together, you can stop breathing and die. That’s usually a common cocktail found in overdose deaths. The combination of Benzodiazepines and opiate drugs.

Rodney: That’s some scary stuff. Speaking of addiction, a lot of the questions out there in the field are, is it social issues? Can it be the economy? Unemployment? Or are some people just predetermined to have like, genetic markers that they’re going to become addicted, or have that in their DNA, per say, that have that genetic marker to be that addicted person?

Dr. Taca: That’s a great question, and I think our field is trying to determine whether there is a genetic link specifically for certain addictions. We’re beginning to understand, at least for the alcohol model and the opiate model, that there is a relationship with somebody getting quickly addicted to at least alcohol or opiates. We know that alcohol has run in families, and we know that some of these alcoholics will do best when you block an opiate receptor. What that suggests is that some people who drink alcohol may have an opiate like effect, which means not only will they get intoxicated from the alcohol, but they’ll have an added opiate like feeling which makes them feel very high. That is a little different than if I would use alcohol and I would get a little disinhibited and maybe kind of dizzy. The people who really cannot stop drinking alcohol really feel high and they will tell you, ‘I feel like I’m floating. I can’t stop drinking. I feel euphoric.’ Many times this is why they black out because they cannot say no and they drink, drink, and drink until they do pass out. The good thing about this type of alcoholic is they do best, believe it or not, when you block that opiate receptor and the craving goes away. So I tell my clients that come in with a very bad history of heavy drinking that they be the one that responded the best to medication management. That gives them hope.

Rodney: My guest is Dr. Arturo Taca of In Synergy. He is the medical director; he’s a diplomat American Board of Addiction Medicine, a diplomat of the American Board of Psychiatry, diplomat of American Board of Neurology. Their physical address is 114770 Kevin Road, Suite 210 in Creve Coeur. Their telephone number is 314-997-5208. Their website is www.insynergystl.com You can find them on Facebook. One last thing Dr. Taca, I guess congratulation goes out. We’ve seen that you’ve been voted one of the best doctors in America in the field of psychiatry. I understand that’s by some of your peers.

Dr. Taca: Yes, I’m deeply honored that my peers have recognized the leaders in each specialty and I do feel honored being included on this list. It’s a pleasure to be even recognized in the same orbit as many of the people on that list that they have. I’m looking forward to…

Rodney: Many more accolades I’m sure.

Dr. Taca: Yes, thank you.

Rodney: We will be returning. My guest is Dr. Arturo Taca on the RSVP Health radio show.