In modern psychiatry the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-V) substance use disorder (SUD) is defined as a pattern of behaviors and symptoms that arise from an addiction to a substance despite negative effects. The most simple way to understand addiction is that it is a learned behavior, which is often exhibited in response to the individual’s attempt to regulate their function and emotion. As emotion is at the core of the most basic functions of the human experience it provides intoxicating substances a very powerful, although short-term advantage in overcoming perceived challenges and stressors. Furthermore, by placing additional disruptions to the brain SUD is known to precipitate other mental health predispositions which in turn increase the risk of continued substance use. 

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Current treatments of addiction consist of either medically managed detox, and residential or outpatient rehabilitation programs with modest success rates, which are less due to their design but more to the mismatch between their scope of influence and the actual neurological root of the addictive process.

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An intervention that is able to reduce the feelings such as restlessness, irritability, nausea, and insomnia that typify the cravings of SUD and addiction would prove to be distinctly advantageous in the rehabilitative context/recovery.