Arndt Stephan, Gunter Tracy D, Acion Laura
Department of Psychiatry, Carver College of Medicine, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA 52246, USA.
Am J Geriatr Psychiatry. 2005 May;13(5):385-92. doi: 10.1176/appi.ajgp.13.5.385.
The number of older people with substance abuse problems is expected to increase over the next decade. Given the expected growth in the number of elderly clients needing substance abuse treatment, the authors provide a description of admissions of patients age 55 years and over to facilities receiving some public funds.
The Treatment Episode Data Set (TEDS), a public-use data-set, contained information on 58,073 admissions to substance treatment (age 55+) and 1,043,910 admissions age 30-54 years.
Older admissions listed only one substance-daily use of alcohol. Admission record notations indicated that these admissions were more frequently associated with income, insurance, and marriage or divorce than younger admissions. As in younger admissions, criminal justice was a major source of referral to treatment. Older patients' admissions records indicated fewer previous treatment experiences. Older male and female admissions were similar in many regards, but differed in their treatment history. The current treatment admission was more often the first for female admissions. Older female admissions were likely to be more educated than their male counterparts, with a later age at onset.
Older admissions to substance abuse treatment differed in important ways from younger adult admissions. The older admissions tended to come from a more stable environment (income, insurance, marriage). Despite their very high frequency and amount of drinking, few of these admissions were referred to treatment by healthcare workers.
预计在未来十年，存在药物滥用问题的老年人数量将会增加。鉴于需要药物滥用治疗的老年患者数量预计会增长，作者描述了55岁及以上患者入住接受部分公共资金的机构的情况。
治疗事件数据集（TEDS）是一个供公众使用的数据集，包含了58073例药物治疗入院病例（年龄55岁及以上）以及1043910例30 - 54岁入院病例的信息。
老年入院患者仅列出一种药物——每日饮酒。入院记录注释表明，与年轻入院患者相比，这些入院患者与收入、保险以及婚姻或离婚的关联更为频繁。与年轻入院患者一样，刑事司法是转介接受治疗的主要来源。老年患者的入院记录显示他们之前的治疗经历较少。老年男性和女性入院患者在很多方面相似，但在治疗史方面存在差异。当前的治疗入院对女性入院患者来说更常是首次。老年女性入院患者可能比男性入院患者受教育程度更高，发病年龄更晚。
药物滥用治疗的老年入院患者在重要方面与年轻成年入院患者不同。老年入院患者往往来自更稳定的环境（收入、保险、婚姻）。尽管他们饮酒频率极高且饮酒量很大，但这些入院患者中很少有被医护人员转介接受治疗的。
