Drug dependence and psychological distress in Portuguese patients entering a substance abuse treatment center

• Autores: Paulo Pinto Pereira Machado, John M. Klein
• Localización: International journal of clinical and health psychology, ISSN 1697-2600, Vol. 7, Nº. 1, 2007, págs. 83-91
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • In the current state of art of drug dependence treatment programs, psychopathological features seem to be associated with negative therapeutic outcome.

    Drug abuse and especially drug dependence are complex disorders that include cognitive, behavioral and physiologic signs and symptoms. The wide spectrum of symptoms that characterize these disorders are responsible for clinical heterogeneity in terms of clinical presentation, severity, vulnerability, sequelae, and comorbidity which by itself accounts for great suffering and need for help in several areas. Assessment of both drug abuse and psychological distress constitutes a major challenge for professionals working with drug addicts. In the present descriptive study we tried to explore some key characteristics of individuals with a drug addiction when starting a treatment program. A total of 107 participants visiting a large metropolitan Portuguese addiction treatment center participated in this study, 90.7% were male, aged between 22 and 55 years (M = 34.84, SD = 6.44).

    The results indicate the existence of some relationships between severity of drug addiction and psychopathological symptoms.