Surveys show the vast majority of older drug addicts and alcoholics reported first using their substance of choice many years earlier.

However, older people metabolize alcohol differently from their younger counterparts causing more severe damage.

That lifelong use can lead to liver damage, memory loss, hepatitis and a host of other medical issues.

A minority of people find comfort in drugs and alcohol far later in life, fueled by drastic life changes, loneliness or legitimate physical pain.

Seniors use the drugs and alcohol as a coping mechanism whether it is loss and loneliness or feeling of displacement.

Experts have observed a rise in illicit drug use, while treatment for alcohol has dropped even though it remains the chief addiction among older adults. The 2008 statistics show 59.9 percent of those 50 and older seeking treatment cited alcohol as their primary substance, down from 84.6 percent in 1992. Heroin came in second, accounting for 16 percent of admissions in that age group, more than double its share in the earlier survey. Cocaine was third, at 11.4 percent, more than four times its 1992 rate.