Citation

Pani PP, Maremmani AGI, Trogu E, Vigna-Taglianti F, Mathis F, Diecidue R, Kirchmayer U, Amato L, Ghibaudi J, Camposeragna A, Saponaro A, Davoli M, Faggiano F, Maremmani I. Ann. Gen. Psychiatry 2016; 15(1).

Copyright

(Copyright © 2016, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group - BMC)

DOI

10.1186/s12991-016-0100-8

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

BACKGROUND: We previously found a five cluster of psychological symptoms in heroin use disorder (HUD) patients: 'worthlessness-being trapped', 'somatic-symptoms', 'sensitivity-psychoticism', 'panic-anxiety', and 'violence-suicide'. We demonstrated that this aggregation is independent of the chosen treatment, of intoxication status and of the presence of psychiatric problems.

METHODS: 2314 Subjects, with alcohol, heroin or cocaine dependence were assigned to one of the five clusters. Differences between patients dependent on alcohol, heroin and cocaine in the frequency of the five clusters and in their severity were analysed. The association between the secondary abuse of alcohol and cocaine and the five clusters was also considered in the subsample of HUD patients.

RESULTS: We confirmed a positive association of the 'somatic symptoms' dimension with the condition of heroin versus cocaine dependence and of the 'sensitivity-psychoticism' dimension with the condition of alcohol versus heroin dependence. 'Somatic symptoms' and 'panic anxiety' successfully discriminated between patients as being alcohol, heroin or cocaine dependents. Looking at the subsample of heroin dependents, no significant differences were observed.

CONCLUSIONS: The available evidence coming from our results, taken as a whole, seems to support the extension of the psychopathological structure previously observed in opioid addicts to the population of alcohol and cocaine dependents. © 2016 Pani et al.

Language: en

Keywords

adult; human; female; male; alcohol; Alcohol; alcoholism; psychosis; disease severity; Addiction; Cocaine; cocaine; Psychopathology; Heroin; major clinical study; mental disease; controlled study; panic; cross-sectional study; diamorphine; psychosomatic disorder; cohort analysis; cocaine dependence; heroin dependence; Article; Symptom Checklist 90; SCL-90