Outpatient Treatment of PCP Abusers

Abstract

Despite the persistence of phencyclidine (PCP) abuse as a public health problem in many urban areas of the United States, there are no published data on outpatient treatment outcome. We studied 37 unselected male PCP abusers (mean age 32 years, 73% Black, 19% married, 68% unemployed) who attended at least one outpatient treatment session at the Brentwood Division, West Los Angeles VA Medical Center. Subjects had smoked PCP for an average of 7 years, with 84% using it at least weekly (38% daily) and 76% using other drugs (alcohol, marijuana, or cocaine). All subjects reported psychological dependence on PCP (i.e., liking PCP use and difficulty stopping despite adverse consequences), while none reported a physiological withdrawal syndrome when stopping PCP use. Subjects stayed in treatment an average of 21 weeks (range 1–155 weeks), attending an average of 68% of the group meetings. PCP was detected in weekly urine samples 78% of the time, with verbal self-report of recent PCP use occurring before 29% of the group meetings. Four subjects (11%) achieved at least 1 year of abstinence, 10 (30%) transferred to residential treatment or a community recovery home, 16 (48%) dropped out of treatment, and two (6%) were jailed. Treatment outcome was not significantly associated with subject characteristics. Age was the only subject characteristic that significantly predicted length of stay (r =. 40).