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Traumatic Events and Substance Use Disorders in Adolescents
Lukas A Basedow1, Sören Kuitunen-Paul1, Veit Roessner1
1Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, TU Dresden, Dresden, Germany.
Objectives:
Adolescents with substance use disorders (SUD) frequently report traumatic events (TEs) and symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). This study aimed to assess whether lifetime prevalence rates of TEs and PTSD are related to SUD severity in adolescent psychiatric patients.
Methods:
We analyzed N = 114 self-reports of treatment-seeking German adolescents aged 12 to 18 years, who visited a specialized SUD outpatient unit. Standardized questionnaires were applied to assess SUD severity, the number of TEs and DSM-IV PTSD criteria.
Results:
Patients fulfilling PTSD criteria (28% of the total sample) had a higher Drug Use Disorders Identification Test (DUDIT) score compared to non-PTSD patients with TEs (p <.001), and compared to adolescents without TEs or PTSD (p = .003). Additionally, SUD severity was positively associated with the number of TEs and the number of intrusion, hyperarousal, and avoidance symptoms (all r = .33 to.48, all p <.01).
Discussion:
Adolescent patients with SUD reported 3-times higher rates of TEs, and a 5-time higher prevalence of PTSD following TEs, than the general adolescent population. Adolescent SUD patients with PTSD reported more severe substance use problems than patients without PTSD-regardless of previous TEs. Longitudinal studies are needed in order to investigate the temporal relationship between TEs, PTSD and SUD.
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