Phenomenology of inhalant abuse among adolescent in Urban India

The deliberate inhalation of volatile substance can cause serious harm to psychological, emotional and neurobiological development. Inhalants are considered to be harmful substance used as it is linked with high rate of morbidity. Lack of knowledge, expertise in the field of inhalant dependence, resulted in little research about the subject. Current research is focused on evaluation of the symptomatology of inhalant intoxication and withdrawal.

This is a prospective cross-sectional study of inhalant users in 32 cases meeting criteria for inhalant abuse according to DSM-IV-TR in a tertiary-level multi-specialty hospital.

The most common inhalant used was whitener and most common method was sniffing. Among all intoxication symptoms, euphoria was most common (97%) followed by hallucinations (88%), burning in oropharynx (69%), light headedness (47%), drowsiness (38%) etc. Common withdrawal features reported were: craving (97%), irritability (94%), restlessness (88%), insomnia (78%) etc.