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Abuse resistant drug formulations are the latest innovative products from drug manufacturers, and these are designed so that they are harder or even impossible to abuse. One method is a powder which turns into a gel if it is moistened, and this change was designed to keep people from crushing up powerful pain medications like oxycodone and then snorting these for a faster effect and a better high. Instead of powder some capsules have little spheres of medication inside, and these are almost impossible to snort so the pill must be taken as intended to get the desired effect. Abuse resistant drug formulations are designed to help prevent prescription medication abuse and ensure that the drug can not be misused easily.

There are several abuse resistant drug formulations already on the market, and pharmaceutical companies are continuously developing additional ways to make these drugs safer and less prone to abuse. Prescription pain medications are causing an epidemic across the USA and North America, with many of these drugs being diverted to illegal street use instead of being used as intended. Proper pain management is essential but this category of drugs carries much higher abuse and addiction rates than most other categories. The development of abuse resistant drug formulations can help prevent drugs from being snorted or injected so that they can be easily abused. These formulations are not fool proof though, if the pill is swallowed it will work as designed, and the individual taking the drug this way may not be the individual that the drug was actually prescribed for. Strict oversight of prescribing practices are also needed.