Monday, May 16, 2005

Mother's Serious Mental Illness and Substance Use among Youths New report from SAMHSA - "Although substance use and serious mental illness (SMI) tend to occur together among adults and parental substance use is associated with an increased risk of substance use in the offspring,research findings are not conclusive about whether substance use among youths is associated with parental mental illness.This report focuses on the association between mother's SMI and substance use among youths aged 12 to 17." Principal findings include: "In 2002 and 2003, an annual average of 2 million (12 percent) mothers living with youths aged 12 to 17 had serious mental illness (SMI) during the past year; among youths aged 12 to 17, 3 million (12.1 percent) youths lived with a mother who had SMI; youths living with a mother who had SMI had an increased risk of past month alcohol or illicit drug use compared with youths living with a mother who did not have SMI." See also the page at the SAMHSA site linking to related resources.   
  

Caring for the caregiver: Concurrent disorders pose unique challenges for families Article in the Spring 2005 issue of Cross Currents, published by Toronto's Centre for Addiction and Mental Health - "...A 2002 study in the Community Mental Health Journal found that people with concurrent disorders have more difficulty managing daily living tasks than people with a single disorder and that their caregivers spend more time in direct care, crisis intervention, creating structured activities and providing financial support. They also reported greater dissatisfaction with their family relationships, compared to people with a single diagnosis. What this translates into is a strong need for support for caregivers. This gaping necessity is exactly why the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) in Toronto in partnership with Elmgrove Services at Brockville Psychiatric Hospital in Brockville, Ontario, is running the first study in Canada to examine how to best support these families in a group environment."  
  

Integrated chemical-dependency and mental-health treatment best for adolescents Story at Medical News Today (UK) - "Adolescents with alcohol- and drug-use disorders often have co-occurring mental-health disorders. 'Dual-diagnosis' patients - those with co-occurring substance-abuse and mental-health problems - tend to have less successful chemical-dependency (CD) treatment outcomes. Findings indicate that dual-diagnosis adolescents in private, managed-care CD treatment who receive psychiatric services have better CD-treatment outcomes than those not receiving these services. Adolescents with alcohol- and drug-use disorders often have co-occurring mental-health disorders. Furthermore, patients with co-occurring substance-abuse and mental-health problems tend to have less successful chemical-dependency (CD) treatment outcomes. A recent study of adolescent patients in private, managed-care CD treatment has found that those individuals who receive needed psychiatric services are more likely to be abstinent from both alcohol and drugs than those not receiving these services. Results are published in the May issue of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research."