Rehab Center Treats Young Athletes Who Slid From Pain Killer Use To Heroin Addiction
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- As the heroin epidemic rages across the country high school athletes are becoming addicted in alarming numbers.
Sports injuries lead to pain medications and that can be the beginning of a downward spiral.
As CBS2's Kenneth Craig reported, there is a treatment center in Garrison, near West Point, where young athletes come for help.
Robert King, 24, is struggling to get back on track after a promising life fell to pieces.
"I just felt like I could do anything, I felt like I was invincible," King said.
He was a high school wrestler, but when he broke his foot his doctor prescribed the addictive pain killer percocet.
"Once I started taking pills I never really stopped," he said.
In just a few years he moved on to the cheaper alternative; heroin.
It's a trend seen all across the country. One study shows adolescent athletes in high injury sports are 50 percent more likely to abuse prescription pain killers.
Jason Ruggeri started taking painkillers after injuring his knee during college football practice.
He said his doctor didn't warn him about how powerful the pills could be. Pain killers led to heroin, which led to an accidental overdose.
"It also left me completely homeless and on the street," he said.
King and Ruggeri found treatment at St. Christopher's Inn which runs one of New York's most successful rehab programs.
Director David Gerber said about a quarter of the shelter's residents are athletes.
"These medications mask the pain, but do nothing to treat the injury. So it often times worsens the injury making the need for more medications and they become addicted," Gerber said.
King's brother was an addict too.
"He was trying to help me, and he did. He got me to get into recovery in the first place," he said.
Just weeks ago his brother died of a heroin overdose. Robert said that's his inspiration for staying clea.
Heroin use among 18 to 25-year-olds has more than doubled in the last decade.
