Drug abuse and viral hepatitis among psychiatric admissions to a Finnish psychiatric emergency ward

Abstract

In Finland injection drug abuse has recently re-emerged as a public health problem, particularly among young age groups. This is reflected in a rapid increase in the incidence of hepatitis virus infections. Since substance abuse in general is a problem among psychiatric admissions, we decided to study the prevalence of viral infections and chemically defined drug abuse among a cohort of psychiatric admissions in Helsinki. During a 3-month period 650 admissions were studied by clinical and laboratory methods. Forty-five admitted injection drug abuse, most of them amphetamine. Alcohol and benzodiazepine abuse was quite common. The urine test detected substances suggesting abuse in 18 patients. Altogether 82 patients had signs of present or past viral hepatitis; 15 had hepatitis C virus only; 45 had hepatitis B virus only; 21 had both viruses; and 1 was positive for human immunodeficiency virus. Several patients with needle marks suggesting drug injection were negative for viral markers. The result shows that viral infections correlated with injection drug abuse are common among psychiatric admissions in Finland even though the background prevalence in the general population is low.