Patterns of mephedrone use in Kadaň and its surroundings: a qualitative study

Background: In few last years we can see a rise of use of a new psychoactive substances, not only in population of problem users, but in the general population, too. These substances mimic the affects of illegal drugs and using them can cause simmilar risks as using illegal drugs (EMCDDA, 2009c). The most commonly used new psychoactive substance is mephedrone. In last 4 years mephedrone has spread very fast in the european drug market, especially in Great Britain (Zaostřeno na drogy 4, 2010), where mephedrone became the 6th most popular drug in 2010 (Kuchař in Kalina et al., 2015). Prevalence researches of mephedrone have not been realized yet in Czech republic, but research made by National monitoring center focused on internet users in 2001 shows that from 1091 respondents in age range of 15 to 35, 50 have used new psychoactive substances. This 50 respondents and other 101 recruited by snowball sampling have participated in follow-up research, one third of this respondents have used mephedrone. Aims: The aim of the study was to describe patterns of use of mephedrone among its users in Kadaň and its surroundings. Emphasis is mainly placed on patterns of users bahavior from purchasing to aplication of mephedrone, what the intoxication looks like, which motives leads users to mephedrone use and with..