Utilization of emergency and hospital services among individuals in substance abuse treatment.
BACKGROUND
To examine risk factors for use of hospital services among racial and ethnic minority clients in publicly funded substance abuse treatment in Los Angeles County, California. We explored cross-sectional annual data (2006 to 2009) from the Los Angeles County Participant Reporting System for adult participants (n=73,251) who received services from treatment programs (n=231).


METHODS
This retrospective analysis of county admission data relied on hierarchical linear negative binomial regression models to explore number of hospital visits, accounting for clients nested in programs. Client data were collected during personal interviews at admission.


RESULTS
Our findings support previous work that noted increased use of emergency rooms among individuals suffering from mental health- and substance use-related issues and extend the knowledge base by highlighting other important features such as treatment need, i.e., residential compared to outpatient treatment.


CONCLUSIONS
These findings have implications for health care policy in terms of the need to increase prevention services and reduce costly hospitalization for a population at significant risk of co-occurring mental and physical disorders.
School of Social Work, University of Southern California, 669 West 34th Street, Los Angeles, CA 90089, USA. jcederba@usc.edu.
Julie A
JA
Cederbaum
Erick G
EG
Guerrero
Keyon R
KR
Mitchell
Tina
T
Kim
D000328:Adult; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D004632:Emergency Medical Services / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D005006:Ethnicity / Q000523:psychology; D005260:Female; D006760:Hospitalization / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D015141:Los Angeles / Q000453:epidemiology; D008297:Male; D020380:Needs Assessment; D010045:Outpatients / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D010342:Patient Acceptance of Health Care / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D019966:Substance-Related Disorders / Q000523:psychology / Q000628:therapy*; D055815:Young Adult