Family, Friends and Neighbors: The Role of Primary Groups in Preventing the Misuse of Drugs

Primary groups such as relatives, neighbors and friends are a source of support that health care providers overlook. We present a theoretical framework which suggests primary groups can help prevent the misuse of prescription medicine. Kin are especially helpful in assisting elderly to take medications on a long-term basis where the regimens are fairly simple. It may also be especially important to engage kin in helping the older minority woman to understand the doctor. Even at a distance, kin may be able to provide such assistance and should not be discounted as a resource. Neighbors can be helpful in getting a medicine needed unexpectedly and might assist with relatively complex routines that last for only a brief period. Friends who have had similar experiences are especially helpful when the medicine is prescribed on an as needed basis by teaching the client how to judge when a dose is needed.

Drugs, Gender and Ethnicity: Is the Older Minority Woman at Risk?

Our knowledge of drug misuse by older women of color is very limited. This introductory article attempts to provide some background for the following chapters and an integrated overview of the issue as a whole. The reader is provided with a discussion of ethnicity and some data describing the experiences of ethnic women of color. Then the scope of the problem of drug misuse in considered. Finally the role of professionals and non-professionals in prevention and treatment is explored, followed by policy considerations.