Psychiatric News (9/14) reports researchers posit that “mental health disorders may be a stronger factor than substance use disorders in” people with recent criminal legal involvement “seeking health services,” according to findings published online Sept. 7 in Psychiatric Services, a publication of the American Psychiatric Association. The study of “9,039 community-dwelling adults 18 years and over who indicated they had been arrested, on probation, and/or on parole/supervised release in the past year” revealed that “compared with individuals with neither disorder, those with mental illness had an average of 1.46 times as many outpatient visits, 1.43 times as many emergency department visits, and 2.14 times as many days spent in inpatient care.” What’s more, people “with comorbid mental illness and substance use disorder had 1.62 times as many emergency department visits and 4.16 times as many inpatient days as those with neither disorder.”
Related Links:
— “Study Explores Factors Driving Health Care Use Among Those Involved With Criminal Legal System, Psychiatric News , September 14, 2023