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Substance use more likely among patients with mental illness

Patients with psychotic disorders are more likely to drink alcohol, smoke cigarettes and use recreational drugs, recent data show.

Researchers assessed 18,612 patients with mental illnesses. Of those, 5,586 patients had schizophrenia, 1,507 had bipolar disorder with psychotic features, 1,486 had the bipolar subtype of schizoaffective disorder, and 552 had the depressed subtype of schizoaffective disorder. The control group consisted of 10,311 patients with no history of mental illness. The study analyzed participants’ drinking, smoking and drug use.

Data showed that 30% of participants with a mental illness engaged in binge drinking, defined as consuming four servings of alcohol at one time. Within the control group, 8% binge drank. Among those with mental illness, 75% regularly smoked cigarettes vs. 33% of the control group who smoked regularly. Fifty percent of those with a mental illness chronically used marijuana vs. 18% of those without a mental illness.

“Some studies have shown that although we psychiatrists know that smoking, drinking and substance abuse are major problems among the mentally ill, we often don’t ask our patients about those things. We can do better, but we also need to develop new strategies because many interventions to reduce smoking, drinking and drug use that have worked in other patient populations don’t seem to be very effective in these psychiatric patients,” study researcher Sarah M. Hartz, MD, PhD, an assistant professor at Washington University, said in a press release.

Disclosure: One researcher listed as an inventor on United States patented “Markers for Addiction.”