Adolescent Substance Use and Abuse Prevention and Treatment: Primary Care Strategies Involving Social Networks and the Geography of Risk and Protection

The use and abuse of licit and illicit substances in adolescence is a national public health concern. This behavior impairs healthy development for many adolescents in the United States. Although not every adolescent who becomes a regular user of licit and illicit substances will develop a substance abuse disorder, all adolescents using these substances can experience a life-threatening outcome. Understanding the epidemiology and social profile of adolescent substance use, namely the risk and protective factors and the environmental and genetic factors, is essential to the development of strategies for prevention. There are many methods that can be employed to better assess environments in which adolescents live. The method discussed in this paper is descriptive and utilizes Geographic Information Systems (GIS) technology. The primary goal of this paper is to illustrate and describe an analysis of substance using and non-substance using adolescents, their social networks, the risky and protective settings where they socialize, and the relationship of these variables to health outcomes such as substance use, depression, and stress. Published data from the researchers’ recent investigation examine the effect of social network affiliations and geographical risk factors on drug involvement and illustrate how these factors may then be incorporated into prevention and intervention planning, especially in medical settings.

[1]  Barton J. Hirsch,et al.  Psychological dimensions of social networks: A multimethod analysis , 1979 .

[2]  José Szapocznik,et al.  An ecodevelopmental framework for organizing the influences on drug abuse: A developmental model of risk and protection. , 1999 .

[3]  D. Moberg,et al.  The adolescent drug involvement scale , 1991 .

[4]  D. Patel,et al.  Substance abuse in adolescents: a complex conundrum for the clinician. , 2003, Pediatric clinics of North America.

[5]  D. Simkin.  Adolescent substance use disorders and comorbidity. , 2002, Pediatric clinics of North America.

[6]  W. Wadland,et al.  Medical comorbidity in addictive disorders. , 2004, The Psychiatric clinics of North America.

[7]  D. Cherry,et al.  National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey: 2002 summary. , 2004, Advance data.

[8]  A. Mclellan,et al.  "Intensive" outpatient substance abuse treatment: comparisons with "traditional" outpatient treatment. , 1997, Journal of addictive diseases.

[9]  G. Chang,et al.  Validity of the CRAFFT substance abuse screening test among adolescent clinic patients. , 2002, Archives of pediatrics & adolescent medicine.

[10]  Michael J. Kovacs.  Children’s Depression Inventory , 2014 .

[11]  N. Ialongo,et al.  The Relationship Between Perceptions of Neighborhood Characteristics and Substance Use Among Urban African American Adolescents , 2004, American journal of community psychology.

[12]  M. Newcomb.  Psychosocial predictors and consequences of drug use: a developmental perspective within a prospective study. , 1997, Journal of addictive diseases.

[13]  Howard F. Andrews,et al.  The Ecology of Risk and the Geography of Intervention: From Research to Practice for the Health and Well‐being of Urban Children , 1985 .

[14]  D. Czechowicz,et al.  Adolescent Drug Abuse: Clinical Assessment and Therapeutic Interventions. Proceedings of a meeting. Bethesda, Maryland, May 13-14, 1993. , 1995, NIDA research monograph.

[15]  Greg J. Duncan,et al.  Neighborhood Poverty: Context and Consequences for Children, Volume I, and Neighborhood Poverty: Policy Implications in Studying Neighborhoods, Volume II , 1999 .

[16]  Immigration and geographic access to prenatal clinics in Brooklyn, NY: a geographic information systems analysis. , 2005, American journal of public health.

[17]  B. Ostro,et al.  Proximity of California public schools to busy roads. , 2003, Environmental health perspectives.

[18]  Kenneth W Griffin,et al.  Preventing illicit drug use in adolescents: long-term follow-up data from a randomized control trial of a school population. , 2000, Addictive behaviors.

[19]  J. Pleck,et al.  Risk, Resilience, and Development: The Multiple Ecologies of Black Adolescents. , 1993 .

[20]  A. Morral,et al.  Adolescent substance abuse treatment in the United States: exemplary models from a national evaluation study. , 2003 .

[21]  A. Elster,et al.  AMA guidelines for adolescent preventive services (GAPS) : recommendations and rationale , 1994 .

[22]  U. Bronfenbrenner.  The Ecology of Human Development: Experiments by Nature and , 1979 .

[23]  A. Kimball Romney,et al.  Systematic Data Collection , 1988 .

[24]  S. Coupey,et al.  Clinical evaluation of substance abuse. , 2002, Pediatrics in review.

[25]  Michael Mason,et al.  Substance Use, Social Networks, and the Geography of Urban Adolescents , 2004, Substance use & misuse.

[26]  M. Leff.  Drug Abuse: Origins and Interventions , 2002 .

[27]  Patrick M. O'Malley,et al.  Monitoring the Future National Results on Adolescent Drug Use: Overview of Key Findings, 2004. , 2003 .

[28]  G. Comerci,et al.  Substance abuse: an overview. , 2000, Adolescent medicine.

[29]  H. Mccubbin,et al.  Family assessment inventories for research and practice , 1987 .

[30]  Andrés Martin,et al.  Is the party over? Cannabis and juvenile psychiatric disorder: the past 10 years. , 2004, Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.

[31]  J. Kahn,et al.  The stability and impact of environmental factors on substance use and problems after adolescent outpatient treatment for cannabis abuse or dependence. , 2005, Psychology of addictive behaviors : journal of the Society of Psychologists in Addictive Behaviors.