Although there exists a plethora of studies in the field of addictions treatment examining the factors that predict successful treatment outcome, the profile of persons who benefit the most from treatment has not yet emerged. The present investigation was conducted to evaluate treatment outcomes of various groups of individuals with different substance related disorders, to determine the prevalence of psychiatric comorbidity among these groups and to examine predictors of treatment outcome. Two hundred and thirty-nine substance abusing males and females were extensively assessed at admission with regards to demographic characteristics, substance use variables, psychiatric comorbidity and cognitive functioning. Six-month in-treatment performance was evaluated by monitoring length of stay in treatment, rates of abstinence, attendance in therapy sessions and completion status at discharge. Results indicated that clients with opiate addiction had the worst prognosis and outcome profiles. Elevated rates of psychiatric disorders and moderate to severe psychological distress were observed among these individuals. High levels of depression were found among females and persons abusing alcohol. Outcome data showed that the primary drug of abuse, frequency of use and reason for entering treatment were the most significant predictors of outcome. Even though these variables predicted treatment outcome, their predictive validity was minimal thus limiting interpretability of findings and dictating a need for more research.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.20278 |
| Date | January 1997 |
| Creators | Paraherakis, Antonios. |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Master of Science (Department of Psychiatry.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 001604688, proquestno: MQ44241, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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