Antisocial alcoholic patients show as much improvement at 14-month follow-up as non-antisocial alcoholic patients.
The authors investigated the impact of DSM-III-R adult criteria for antisocial personality disorder (and co-occurrence of childhood conduct or mood disorder) on one-year changes of multi-domain problem severity in 309 alcoholic patients. Adult antisocial traits were associated with more drug, legal, and psychiatric problems at baseline and with more drug problems at follow-up. However, patients with antisocial traits showed at least as much improvement from baseline through follow-up as their non-antisocial counterparts. Furthermore, the co-occurrence of childhood conduct disorder or mood disorder among the antisocial alcoholics did not define prognostically relevant subgroups. These findings suggest that antisocial alcoholics benefit from treatment at least as much as non-antisocial alcoholics.
Verheul
R
R
Amsterdam Institute for Addiction Research, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
van den Brink
W
W
Koeter
M W
MW
Hartgers
C
C
D000328:Adult; D000437:Alcoholism / Q000150:complications* / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D000987:Antisocial Personality Disorder / Q000150:complications*; D002653:Child Behavior Disorders / Q000150:complications / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D019964:Mood Disorders / Q000150:complications / Q000523:psychology*; D011379:Prognosis; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D013997:Time Factors; D016896:Treatment Outcome