title: Who is Ready to Change Illicit Drug Use Behavior: An Emergency Department Study.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To identify emergency department patients who are ready to change their illicit drug use behavior.
  
  
  METHODS
  A cross-sectional study of 198 Emergency Department patients at least 18 years old, seeking emergency department services, using at least one illicit drug, and scoring positive for alcohol problem based on CAGE score ≥ 1.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Of the patients, 46% were "not ready" to change their drug behavior, 21% and 33% were "unsure" and "ready", respectively. Our results identified that "Readiness to change alcohol behavior" [t (197) = 3.37, p ≤ 0.001], health insurance [t (197) = -3.011, p ≤ 0.003], number of drug use [t (197) = 2.88, p ≤ 0.004], and drug-related injury [t (197) = 1.98, p ≤ 0.049] were related to readiness to change illicit drug behavior.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our results re-iterate the need for intervention programs that focus on screening and treatment for both drugs and alcohol.
authors.affiliation: Alameda County Medical Center-Highland General Hospital, Department of Emergency Medicine, 1411 E. 31st St., Oakland, CA 94602.
authors.forename: Kenneth A
authors.initials: KA
authors.lastname: Frausto
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Charles Drew University of Medicine and Science, Los Angeles, CA 90059, USA. ; David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California, Los Angeles, CA 90059, USA. Email: shahrzadbazargan@cdrewu.edu or shahrzadb@ucla.edu.
authors.forename: Shahrzad
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Bazargan-Hejazi
keywords: Illicit drug use; emergency department; readiness to change