Creating a Common Language: Definitions for Frequently Used Words and Phrases

• Addiction: According to the American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM), addiction is a primary, chronic, neurobiological disease with genetic, psychological, and environmental factors influencing its development and manifestation. Addiction is characterized by behaviors that include impaired control over drug use, compulsive use, continued use despite harm, and cravings. 
• Alcohol Misuse: Alcohol consumption that puts individuals at increased risk for adverse health and social consequences. It is defined as excess daily consumption (more than 5 drinks per day for men or more than 4 drinks per day for women) and/or excess total consumption (more than 15 drinks per week for men or more than 8 drinks per week for women)
• Alcohol Use Disorder: is a chronic medical condition that meets criteria in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders and is characterized by the impaired ability to stop or control alcohol use, to relieve or avoid withdrawal symptoms, despite adverse social, occupational, or health consequences.
• Binge Drinking: Consuming 4 or more alcoholic beverages per occasion for women or 5 or more drinks per occasion for men. 
• Blood Alcohol Concentration (BAC): Refers to the percent of alcohol in a person's blood stream. A BAC of .10% means that an individual's blood supply contains one part alcohol for every 1000 parts blood. 
• Harm Reduction: policies, programs, and practices that aim to reduce the harms associated with the use of substances
• Heavy Drinking: Consuming 8 or more alcoholic beverages per week for women or 15 or more alcoholic beverages per week for men
• Medical Assisted Treatment (MAT): Medication Assisted Treatment, including Opioid Treatment Programs (OTPs), combines behavioral therapy and medications to treat substance use disorders
• Narcan (Naloxone): An opioid antagonist that works by blocking opioid receptors in the brain, thereby blocking the effects of opioid agonists (heroin, morphine). 
• Narcotic: originally, narcotic referred to psychoactive compounds with sleep inducing properties (typically opioids such as heroin). In moderate doses, narcotics will dull the senses, relieve pain, and induce sleep. In large doses, narcotics will cause stupor, coma, and death. Today however, narcotic is often used in a legal context, where narcotic is used generally to refer to illegal or illicit substances
• Nicotine: a toxic colorless or yellowish oily liquid that is the chief active constituent of tobacco. It acts as a stimulant in small doses, but in larger amounts blocks the action of autonomic nerve and skeletal muscles cells acting as a depressant.
• Opiate: a drug derived directly from the natural opium poppy plant
• Opioid: A family of drugs used therapeutically to treat pain, that also produce a sensation of euphoria (a "high") and are naturally derived from the opium poppy plant (morphine and opium) or synthetically or semi-synthetically produced in a lab to act like an opiate (methadone and oxycodone). Chronic repeated use of opioids can lead to tolerance, physical dependence and addiction. 
• Over-the-counter medications (OTC): Medications directly obtainable in a pharmacy by a consumer without a prescription from a healthcare provider
• Potency: The degree of concentration of the psychoactive ingredient of a substance
• Prescription drug misuse: the use of a medication without a prescription or usage of a drug in a way other than as prescribed; or for the experience of euphoria being elicited. 
• Recovery: the process of improved physical, psychological, and social well-being after having suffered from a substance use disorder
• Standard Drink Size: In the United States, one "standard" drink (or one alcoholic drink equivalent) contains roughly 14 grams of pure alcohol, which is found in: 12 oz of regular beer, 5 oz of wine, and 1.5 oz of distilled spirits. 
• Stigma: an attribute, behavior, or condition that is socially discrediting. Known to decrease treatment seeking behaviors in individuals with substance use disorders
• Substance Use Disorder (SUD): The clinical term describing a syndrome consisting of a coherent set of signs and symptoms that cause significant distress and/or impairment during the same 12-month period. 
• Synthethic Marijuana: Synthethic compounds produced in laboratories to mimic the effects of the active ingredient in marijuana, delta 9 tetrahydrocannabinol (THC). While the intention of these compounds are to mimic the effects of marijuana, this is not always achieved. As one strain of synthetic marijuana is banned and made illegal, new compound combinations are created to avoid regulation. The result is the ongoing creation of compounds that are structurally more and more different from the natural THC found in marijuana, increasing the potential risks associated. Side effects have included vomiting, sweating, seizures, body spasms, rapid and/or irregular heartbeat, increased blood pressure, severe paranoia and hallucinations. 

These definitions and more can be found here