The cumulative risk associated with demographic background characteristics among substance use treatment patients

Abstract

Background: A significant amount of research has been conducted on the association between demographic background characteristics and substance use treatment outcomes among adults, but this body of work has not yet examined how multiple factors in combination magnify the risk for post-treatment substance use.

Methods: The current study utilized a sample of 12,320 adults drawn from the Comprehensive Assessment and Treatment Outcome Research (CATOR) system to investigate how multiple demographic risk factors increase the likelihood of substance use after treatment.

Results: A series of bivariate analyses and multivariate binary logistic regression results demonstrated a clear pattern of increased risk in the presence of a greater number of positive demographic risk factors. These demographic risk factors also amplified the risk of post-treatment substance use in the presence of additional clinical indicators of treatment prognosis.

Conclusion: Select patient demographic background characteristics must be taken into consideration in the early treatment planning stages to improve long-term clinical outcomes.

Keywords:

• Demographic risk
• employment
• marital status
• age
• education
• treatment outcomes
• substance use

Disclosure statement

All authors declare there are no conflicts of interest.

Funding

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.