Assessment of the Short Grit Scale in patients with substance use disorder: Psychometric properties and patient characteristics.

Background: Recovery from substance use disorder requires sustained effort and perseverance. Hence, the resilience factor of grit may be important for people in recovery. Little research has been conducted on grit in patients with substance use disorder (SUD), especially in a large and varied sample.Objectives: To analyze the psychometric properties of the Short Grit Scale (Grit-S) in patients with SUD and to use demographic and clinical characteristics to predict variance in Grit-S scores.Methods: Participants completed the Grit-S and other self-report measures. Psychometric properties of the Grit-S were assessed in outpatients (N = 94, 77.7% male) and a hierarchical regression predicted Grit-S variance in inpatients (N = 1238, 65.0% male).Results: The Grit-S demonstrated good internal consistency (α=.75) and strong test-retest reliability (adjusted r = .79, p < .001). Mean Grit-S score was 3.15, lower than other clinical samples reported in the literature. Regression modeling indicated a moderate, statistically significant association between demographic and clinical characteristics and Grit-S scores (R2 = 15.5%, p < .001). Of particular interest, the positive factor of recovery protection showed the strongest association with Grit-S of all variables assessed (ß=.185 vs. ß = .052-.175 for the remaining significant independent variables).Conclusion: The psychometric properties of the Grit-S in patients with SUD support its use in this population. Moreover, the particularly low grit scores among inpatients with SUDs and the association of grit scores with substance use risk and recovery factors suggest that grit could be useful as a treatment target in this population.

Association of State Social and Environmental Factors With Rates of Self-injury Mortality and Suicide in the United States.

Importance: Self-injury mortality (SIM) combines suicides and the preponderance of drug misuse-related overdose fatalities. Identifying social and environmental factors associated with SIM and suicide may inform etiologic understanding and intervention design. Objective: To identify factors associated with interstate SIM and suicide rate variation and to assess potential for differential suicide misclassification. Design, Setting, and Participants: This cross-sectional study used a partial panel time series with underlying cause-of-death data from 50 US states and the District of Columbia for 1999-2000, 2007-2008, 2013-2014 and 2018-2019. Applying data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, SIM includes all suicides and the preponderance of unintentional and undetermined drug intoxication deaths, reflecting self-harm behaviors. Data were analyzed from February to June 2021. Exposures: Exposures included inequity, isolation, demographic characteristics, injury mechanism, health care access, and medicolegal death investigation system type. Main Outcomes and Measures: The main outcome, SIM, was assessed using unstandardized regression coefficients of interstate variation associations, identified by the least absolute shrinkage and selection operator; ratios of crude SIM to suicide rates per 100 000 population were assessed for potential differential suicide misclassification. Results: A total of 101 325 SIMs were identified, including 74 506 (73.5%) among males and 26 819 (26.5%) among females. SIM to suicide rate ratios trended upwards, with an accelerating increase in overdose fatalities classified as unintentional or undetermined (SIM to suicide rate ratio, 1999-2000: 1.39; 95% CI, 1.38-1.41; 2018-2019: 2.12; 95% CI, 2.11-2.14). Eight states recorded a SIM to suicide rate ratio less than 1.50 in 2018-2019 vs 39 states in 1999-2000. Northeastern states concentrated in the highest category (range, 2.10-6.00); only the West remained unrepresented. Least absolute shrinkage and selection operator identified 8 factors associated with the SIM rate in 2018-2019: centralized medical examiner system (ß = 4.362), labor underutilization rate (ß = 0.728), manufacturing employment (ß = -0.056), homelessness rate (ß = -0.125), percentage nonreligious (ß = 0.041), non-Hispanic White race and ethnicity (ß = 0.087), prescribed opioids for 30 days or more (ß = 0.117), and percentage without health insurance (ß = -0.013) and 5 factors associated with the suicide rate: percentage male (ß = 1.046), military veteran (ß = 0.747), rural (ß = 0.031), firearm ownership (ß = 0.030), and pain reliever misuse (ß = 1.131). Conclusions and Relevance: These findings suggest that SIM rates were associated with modifiable, upstream factors. Although embedded in SIM, suicide unexpectedly deviated in proposed social and environmental determinants. Heterogeneity in medicolegal death investigation processes and data assurance needs further characterization, with the goal of providing the highest-quality reports for developing and tracking public health policies and practices.

Substance Use Disorders in Global Mental Health Delivery: Epidemiology, Treatment Gap, and Implementation of Evidence-Based Treatments.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES: After participating in this activity, learners should be better able to:• Assess the treatment gap for patients with substance use disorders• Evaluate treatments and models of implementation for substance use disorders ABSTRACT: Substance use disorders (SUDs) account for substantial global morbidity, mortality, and financial and social burden, yet the majority of those suffering with SUDs in both low- and middle-income (LMICs) and high-income countries (HICs) never receive SUD treatment. Evidence-based SUD treatments are available, but access to treatment is severely limited. Stigma and legal discrimination against persons with SUDs continue to hinder public understanding of SUDs as treatable health conditions, and to impede global health efforts to improve treatment access and to reduce SUD prevalence and costs. Implementing SUD treatment in LMICs and HICs requires developing workforce capacity for treatment delivery. Capacity building is optimized when clinical expertise is partnered with regional community stakeholders and government in the context of a unified strategy to expand SUD treatment services. Workforce expansion for SUD treatment delivery harnesses community stakeholders to participate actively as family and peer supports, and as trained lay health workers. Longitudinal supervision of the workforce and appropriate incentives for service are required components of a sustainable, community-based model for SUD treatment. Implementation would benefit from research investigating the most effective and culturally adaptable models that can be delivered in diverse settings.

Direct-to-consumer marketing of evidence-based psychological interventions: introduction.

The dissemination and implementation of evidence-based psychological interventions (EBPIs) to service provision settings has been a major challenge. Most efforts to disseminate and implement EBPIs have focused on clinicians and clinical systems as the consumers of these treatments and thus have targeted efforts to these groups. An alternative, complementary approach to achieve more widespread utilization of EBPIs is to disseminate directly to patients themselves. The aim of this special section is to explore several direct-to-consumer (i.e., patient) dissemination and education efforts currently underway. This manuscript highlights the rationale for direct-to-patient dissemination strategies as well as the application of marketing science to dissemination efforts. Achieving greater access to EBPIs will require the use of multiple approaches to overcome the many and varied barriers to successful dissemination and implementation.

Domain-general and domain-specific strategies for the assessment of distress intolerance.

Recent research has provided evidence that distress intolerance-the perceived inability to tolerate distressing states-varies based on the domain of distress (e.g., pain, anxiety). Although domain-specific assessment strategies may provide information targeted to specific disorders or maladaptive behaviors, domain-general measures have the potential to facilitate comparisons across studies, disorders, and populations. The current study evaluated the utilization of self-report measures of distress intolerance as domain-general measures by examining their association with indices of behavioral avoidance and substance craving. Two groups of participants (N = 55) were recruited including a substance-dependent group and a comparison group equated based on the presence of an affective disorder. Results provided support for the validity of domain-general measures for assessing distress intolerance across varied domains. The importance of both domain-general and domain-specific measurement of distress intolerance is discussed.

A novel method for assessing distress intolerance: adaptation of a measure of willingness to pay.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Distress intolerance is a core element of many models of psychopathology and is related to a range of disorders and maladaptive behaviors. However, research on distress intolerance has been hampered by inconsistency in its assessment. Moreover, recent perspectives suggest that distress intolerance varies based on the domain of distress, highlighting the need for a measure that can capture intolerance across types of distress. This paper introduces a novel measure for distress intolerance: an adaptation of the willingness to pay (WTP) measure, which provides a consistent metric for assessing distress intolerance across domains of distress. METHODS: The WTP Distress Intolerance (WTP-DI) measure was administered to two samples of participants and feasibility and validity were evaluated. RESULTS: Evidence from unselected and clinical samples provide evidence for the feasibility and discriminant and concurrent validity of this measure. LIMITATIONS: Testing WTP-DI in larger samples and across additional domains of distress is needed. CONCLUSIONS: The WTP-DI measure provides a new measure of distress intolerance that addresses the primary limitations of existing measures and has potential to serve as a cross domain measure to facilitate comparison across types of distress.

Cost-efficacy of individual and combined treatments for panic disorder.

OBJECTIVE: The objective of this study was to examine the relative cost-efficacy of empirically supported treatments for panic disorder. As psychosocial, pharmacologic, and combined treatments have all demonstrated efficacy in the treatment of panic disorder, cost-efficacy analysis provides an additional source of information to guide clinical decision making. METHOD: Cost-efficacy was examined based on results from the Multicenter Comparative Treatment Study of Panic Disorder, a randomized controlled trial of treatment for panic disorder (DSM-III-R). The trial was conducted from May 1991 to April 1998. Cost-efficacy ratios representing the cost per 1-unit improvement in Panic Disorder Severity Scale mean item score were calculated for 3 monotherapies (cognitive-behavioral therapy [CBT], imipramine, and paroxetine) and 2 combination treatments (CBT-imipramine and CBT-paroxetine) at the end of acute, maintenance, and follow-up phases. RESULTS: Results demonstrated consistently greater cost-efficacy for individual over combined treatments, with imipramine representing the most cost-efficacious treatment option at the completion of the acute phase (cost-efficacy ratio = $972) and CBT representing the most cost-efficacious option at the end of maintenance treatment (cost efficacy ratio = $1449) and 6 months after treatment termination (cost-efficacy ratio = $1227). CONCLUSION: In the context of similar efficacy for combined treatments, but poorer cost-efficacy, current monotherapies should be considered the first-line treatment of choice for panic disorder. Additionally, CBT emerged as the most durable and cost-effective monotherapy and, hence, should be considered as a particularly valuable treatment from the perspective of cost accountability.