Drug Use Among Adolescents and Young Adults with Unsuppressed HIV Who Use Alcohol: Identifying Patterns of Comorbid Drug Use and Associations with Mental Health

TY - JOUR

T1 - Drug Use Among Adolescents and Young Adults with Unsuppressed HIV Who Use Alcohol

T2 - Identifying Patterns of Comorbid Drug Use and Associations with Mental Health

AU - Starks, Tyrel J.

AU - MacDonell, Karen Kolmodin

AU - Pennar, Amy L.

AU - Dinaj-Koci, Veronica

AU - Millar, Brett M.

AU - Naar, Sylvie

N1 - Funding Information: Collection and analyses of these data were supported by a National Institute on Drug Abuse Grant (R01 AA022891; PI: Naar). The funding source had no involvement in study design or in the writing of this article. The authors acknowledge the contributions of the Healthy Choices Project Team, as well as staff, recruiters, interns and our participants who volunteered their time. Publisher Copyright: © 2020, Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.

PY - 2020/10/1

Y1 - 2020/10/1

N2 - Youth living with HIV (YLWH; aged 16–24) are at elevated risk of alcohol and drug use. Studies in older populations have identified patterns or profiles of multiple substance use differentially associated with mental health and anti-retroviral therapy (ART) adherence. No studies of YLWH have yet examined such patterns. A sample of 179 YLWH, reporting ART non-adherence and alcohol use, were recruited at five Adolescent Trials Network clinics in urban areas of the US between November 2014 and August 2017. Participants completed the Alcohol Smoking and Substance Involvement Screening Test (ASSIST) to assess substance use involvement scores, and the Brief Symptom Inventory. Latent Profile Analysis identified three substance use patterns: minimal illicit drug use (15.1%), cannabis only (56.4%), and global polysubstance use (28.5%). Global polysubstance users experienced more mental health problems compared to the minimal illicit drug use group. The co-occurrence of drug use with alcohol was common among these YLWH—all of whom reported ART adherence problems—indicating the importance of interventions capable of addressing multiple substance use rather than alcohol alone.

AB - Youth living with HIV (YLWH; aged 16–24) are at elevated risk of alcohol and drug use. Studies in older populations have identified patterns or profiles of multiple substance use differentially associated with mental health and anti-retroviral therapy (ART) adherence. No studies of YLWH have yet examined such patterns. A sample of 179 YLWH, reporting ART non-adherence and alcohol use, were recruited at five Adolescent Trials Network clinics in urban areas of the US between November 2014 and August 2017. Participants completed the Alcohol Smoking and Substance Involvement Screening Test (ASSIST) to assess substance use involvement scores, and the Brief Symptom Inventory. Latent Profile Analysis identified three substance use patterns: minimal illicit drug use (15.1%), cannabis only (56.4%), and global polysubstance use (28.5%). Global polysubstance users experienced more mental health problems compared to the minimal illicit drug use group. The co-occurrence of drug use with alcohol was common among these YLWH—all of whom reported ART adherence problems—indicating the importance of interventions capable of addressing multiple substance use rather than alcohol alone.

KW - Alcohol use

KW - Drug use

KW - HIV

KW - Medication adherence

KW - Youth

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U2 - https://doi.org/10.1007/s10461-020-02848-8

DO - https://doi.org/10.1007/s10461-020-02848-8

M3 - Article

C2 - 32246358

SN - 1090-7165

VL - 24

SP - 2975

EP - 2983

JO - AIDS and behavior

JF - AIDS and behavior

IS - 10

ER -