Clinical features, comorbid mental disorders and treatment outcomes in female patients with alcohol and drug use disorder admitted to an outpatient unit: A retrospective study

English (OpenAlex)

Clinical features, comorbid mental disorders and treatment outcomes in female patients with alcohol and drug use disorder admitted to an outpatient treatment unit: A retrospective studyBir ayaktan tedavi birimine başvuran alkol ve madde kullanım bozukluğu tanılı kadın hastalarda klinik özellikler, ek ruhsal hastalıklar ve tedavi sonuçları: Retrospektif bir çalışma SUMMARY Objective: The studies on alcohol/drug addiction have historically neglected female patients and the results of most studies exclusively conducted on male patients have been generalized to include female population.This study aims to retrospectively investigate the sociodemographic characteristics, alcohol/drug consumption characteristics, comorbid mental illnesses, treatment and follow-up results in female patients who applied to an outpatient addiction clinic for the treatment of alcohol/drug use disorder.Method: The patient files of the consecutive 68 women who visited Ege University Outpatient Addiction Clinic between May 1, 2013 and August 31, 2018 and were diagnosed with alcohol/drug use disorder according to DSM-5 were analyzed.Results: The findings revealed that 60.3% of patients had alcohol, 39.7% had drug use disorder.The drug mainly used by the ones diagnosed with drug use disorder was polydrug with a ratio of 44.4%.The duration of problematic alcohol use in the women diagnosed with alcohol use disorder was 8.3±7.8 years, the duration of problematic drug use in the women diagnosed with drug use disorder was 7.6±5.4years.The age of onset of problematic alcohol use in the group with alcohol use disorder was higher than the age of onset of problematic drug use in the group with drug use disorder (t=3.643,p=0.001).Depressive disorder was observed in 54.2% of all patients.70.5% of patients attended outpatient clinic follow-up at least for a period of 1 month, 47.9% of the patients who attended follow-up appointments at least for a period of 1 month received maintenance treatment and 37.5% of those maintained complete abstinence during that period.Discussion: The findings of this study with the largest sample in our country where sociodemographic and clinical characteristics are evaluated in a group of female patients diagnosed with alcohol/drug use disorder should be developed and supported by controlled and longitudinal follow-up studies.