Gender and Use of Substance Abuse Treatment Services

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Abstract

Women are more likely than men to face multiple barriers to accessing substance abuse treatment and are less likely to seek treatment. Women also tend to seek care in mental health or primary care settings rather than in specialized treatment programs, which may contribute to poorer treatment outcomes. When gender differences in treatment outcomes are reported, however, women tend to fare better than men. Limited research suggests that gender-specific treatment is no more effective than mixed-gender treatment, though certain women may only seek treatment in women-only programs. Future health services research should consider or develop methods for (1) improving care for women who seek help in primary care or mental health settings, (2) increasing the referral of women to specialized addiction treatment, (3) identifying subgroups of women and men who would benefit from gender-specific interventions, and (4) addressing gender-specific risk factors for reduced treatment initiation, continuation, and treatment outcomes.

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Most cited references 55

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Gender differences in the utilization of health care services.

K D Bertakis, R Azari, L J Helms … (2000)

Studies have shown that women use more health care services than men. We used important independent variables, such as patient sociodemographics and health status, to investigate gender differences in the use and costs of these services. New adult patients (N = 509) were randomly assigned to primary care physicians at a university medical center. Their use of health care services and associated charges were monitored for 1 year of care. Self-reported health status was measured using the Medical Outcomes Study Short Form-36 (SF-36). We controlled for health status, sociodemographic information, and primary care physician specialty in the statistical analyses. Women had significantly lower self-reported health status and lower mean education and income than men. Women had a significantly higher mean number of visits to their primary care clinic and diagnostic services than men. Mean charges for primary care, specialty care, emergency treatment, diagnostic services, and annual total charges were all significantly higher for women than men; however, there were no differences for mean hospitalizations or hospital charges. After controlling for health status, sociodemographics, and clinic assignment, women still had higher medical charges for all categories of charges except hospitalizations. Women have higher medical care service utilization and higher associated charges than men. Although the appropriateness of these differences was not determined, these findings have implications for health care.

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Matching Alcoholism Treatments to Client Heterogeneity: Project MATCH posttreatment drinking outcomes.

BA Mattson, WR Miller, JP Allen (1996)

To assess the benefits of matching alcohol dependent clients to three different treatments with reference to a variety of client attributes. Two parallel but independent randomized clinical trials were conducted, one with alcohol dependent clients receiving outpatient therapy (N = 952; 72% male) and one with clients receiving aftercare therapy following inpatient or day hospital treatment (N = 774; 80% male). Clients were randomly assigned to one of three 12-week, manual-guided, individually delivered treatments: Cognitive Behavioral Coping Skills Therapy, Motivational Enhancement Therapy or Twelve-Step Facilitation Therapy. Clients were then monitored over a 1-year posttreatment period. Individual differences in response to treatment were modeled as a latent growth process and evaluated for 10 primary matching variables and 16 contrasts specified a priori. The primary outcome measures were percent days abstinent and drinks per drinking day during the 1-year posttreatment period. Clients attended on average two-thirds of treatment sessions offered, indicating that substantial amounts of treatment were delivered, and research follow-up rates exceeded 90% of living subjects interviewed at the 1-year posttreatment assessment. Significant and sustained improvements in drinking outcomes were achieved from baseline to 1-year posttreatment by the clients assigned to each of these well-defined and individually delivered psychosocial treatments. There was little difference in outcomes by type of treatment. Only one attribute, psychiatric severity, demonstrated a significant attribute by treatment interaction: In the outpatient study, clients low in psychiatric severity had more abstinent days after 12-step facilitation treatment than after cognitive behavioral therapy. Neither treatment was clearly superior for clients with higher levels of psychiatric severity. Two other attributes showed time-dependent matching effects: motivation among outpatients and meaning-seeking among aftercare clients. Client attributes of motivational readiness, network support for drinking, alcohol involvement, gender, psychiatric severity and sociopathy were prognostic of drinking outcomes over time. The findings suggest that psychiatric severity should be considered when assigning clients to outpatient therapies. The lack of other robust matching effects suggests that, aside from psychiatric severity, providers need not take these client characteristics into account when triaging clients to one or the other of these three individually delivered treatment approaches, despite their different treatment philosophies.

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Gender differences in substance use disorders.

Aisling Brady, Kate C. Randall (1999)

Despite the fact that the rate of substance abuse and dependence is higher among men than it is among women, the prevalence rates, especially the more recent ones, indicate that a diagnosis of substance abuse is not gender specific. From the emerging literature on gender differences over the past 25 years, male and female substance abusers are clearly not the same. Women typically begin using substances later than do men, are strongly influenced by spouses or boyfriends to use, report different reasons for maintaining the use of the substances, and enter treatment earlier in the course of their illnesses than do men. Importantly, women also have a significantly higher prevalence of comorbid psychiatric disorders, such as depression and anxiety, than do men, and these disorders typically predate the onset of substance-abuse problems. For women, substances such as alcohol may be used to self-medicate mood disturbances, whereas for men, this may not be true. Although these comorbid disorders might complicate treatment for women, women are, in fact, responsive to treatment and do as well as men in follow-up. Gender differences and similarities have significant treatment implications. This is especially true for the telescoping phenomenon, in which the window for intervention between progressive landmarks is shorter for women than for men. This is also true for the gender differences in physical and sexual abuse, as well as other psychiatric comorbidity that is evident in female substance abusers seeking treatment. The barriers to treatment for women are being addressed in many treatment settings to encourage more women to enter treatment, and family and couples therapy are standard therapeutic interventions. Negative consequences associated with substance abuse are different for men and women, and gender-sensitive rating instruments must be used to measure not only the severity of the problem but also to evaluate treatment efficacy. To determine whether gender differences observed over the past 25 years become less demarcated in comparisons of younger cohorts of substance abusers in the future will be interesting. Changing societal roles and attitudes toward women, the increase in women entering the workplace, in general, and into previously male-dominated sports and professions, in particular, may influence not only opportunities to drink but also drinking culture. Some gender differences likely will remain, but other gender differences will probably also emerge. The comparison of male and female substance abusers promises to be a fruitful one for researchers. The translation if the research findings to the treatment community to improve treatment outcome for both sexes will be an equally exciting challenge for the field.

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Journal

Journal ID (nlm-ta): Alcohol Res Health

Journal ID (iso-abbrev): Alcohol Res Health

Title: Alcohol Research & Health

Publisher: National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism

ISSN (Print): 1535-7414

ISSN (Electronic): 1930-0573

Publication date (Print): 2006

Volume: 29

Issue: 1

Pages: 55-62

Affiliations

Carla A. Green, Ph.D., MPH, is a senior investigator at the Center for Health Research, Kaiser Permanente Northwest, and a clinical associate professor in the Department of Public Health and Preventive Medicine and the Department of Psychiatry at Oregon Health & Science University, both positions in Portland, Oregon

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Publisher ID: 55-62

PMC ID: 6470905

PubMed ID: 16767855

SO-VID: 7b062190-e118-4678-9faa-f7fc6057e33a

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Unless otherwise noted in the text, all material appearing in this journal is in the public domain and may be reproduced without permission. Citation of the source is appreciated.

Gender and Use of Substance Abuse Treatment Services

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UCL: UN SDG 05 Gender Equality

Most cited references 55

Gender differences in the utilization of health care services.

Matching Alcoholism Treatments to Client Heterogeneity: Project MATCH posttreatment drinking outcomes.

Gender differences in substance use disorders.

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