Journal of Addiction Research & Therapy
Open Access

Research Article

A 10-year Prospective Study of Mortality among Norwegian Drug Abusers after Seeking Treatment

¹University of Oslo, Norwegian Centre for Addiction Research (SERAF), Ullevål Hospital, 0315 Oslo, Norway

²Norwegian Institute for Alcohol and Drug Research (SIRUS), Øvre Slottsgt. 2B, 0157 Oslo, Norway

³National Addiction Centre, National Addiction Centre, 4 Windsor Walk, London SE5 8BB, UK

Corresponding Author:

Edle Ravndal
University of Oslo
Norwegian Centre for Addiction Research (SERAF)
P.O. Box 1039 Blindern, 0315 Oslo, Norway
Tel: 4723368974
Fax: 4723368986
E-mail: edle.ravndal@medisin.uio.no

Received date: February 10, 2015; Accepted date: March 20, 2015; Published date: March 25, 2015

Citation: Ravndal E, Lauritzen G, Gossop M (2015) A 10-year Prospective Study of Mortality among Norwegian Drug Abusers after Seeking Treatment. J Addict Res Ther 6:216. doi:10.4172/2155-6105.1000216

Copyright: © 2015 Ravndal E, et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Background: Injecting drug users have a mortality risk between 10 and 20 times higher than the general population, and the persistent high mortality rate in most Western countries, and especially in Norway, is a major public health concern. Naturalistic, prospective studies following drug abusers over many years are needed in order to investigate the most important predictors of mortality and for planning strategic preventive measures.

Methods: Four hundred and eighty-one drug abusers were followed prospectively for 10 years after admission to treatment during the period 1998-2009. Following instruments were used: the European Addiction Severity Index, Symptom Checklist-25 and Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory-II. Information on deaths and causes of death were obtained from the National Death Register. Cox regression analysis was used to analyze factors hypothesized to be associated with the risk of death.

Results: A total of 74 deaths were registered during the observation period, which represents a mortality rate of 1.5 per 100 person-years. The main cause of death was overdose, and the relative risk of mortality among males was twice that of females.

Conclusions: Fifteen percent of the drug users in the study died during the 10 years after admission to index treatment. This represents an annual mortality rate of 1.5; which is in line with most similar studies from Europe, showing a mortality rates in the range of 1-2% per year. The main cause of death was overdose (68%). Preventive strategies aiming to reduce mortality among drug users have to be manifold and gender specific, taking into account drug abusers’ life conditions, their modes of thought and how they go about living their lives.

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