Polydrug abuse and personality disorders in a sample of substance-abusing inpatients

Abstract

In the last two decades, polydrug abuse has gained increasing attention and many studies have reported high prevalence rates of this phenomenon. The psychological and demographic correlates and negative associated outcomes of polydrug abuse have also been investigated. These findings support the need of an exploration of the relationship between polydrug abuse and comorbid personality pathology. In fact, although the issue of comorbidity between personality disorders (PDs) and substance use has become an established field of study, the association between dual diagnosis and polydrug abuse has received little attention in the literature. The present study aims to investigate the prevalence of polydrug abuse and personality pathology in a sample of substance-abusing inpatients and to compare polydrug abusers and monodrug abusers in terms of sociodemographic characteristics, medical and case history data, outcome variables, and PDs. The files of 117 consecutively admitted inpatients were reviewed, and information on medical history, case history, and personality disorder diagnosis was collected. The majority of patients were polydrug abusers (53.8%) and the prevalence rate of PDs was 47.0%. No sociodemographic differences emerged between polydrug and monodrug abusers, whereas polydrug abusers were more likely to have a history of treatment dropout and reported first contact with substances at a lower age. Polydrug abusers were also more prone tohave at least one Axis II diagnosis and had a higher number of personality disorder diagnoses compared with monodrug abusers. The high prevalence of polydrug abuse found in this study is in agreement with the literature. Polydrug abusers show a more severe profile compared with monodrug abusers, indicating that further studies should be performed in both clinical and research fields.

Keywords:

• polydrug abuse
• personality disorders
• comorbidity
• dropout