Substance Abuse Profiles of Patients Admitted to the Alcohol and Drug Addiction Research, Treatment, and Education Center in Turkey

Objectives: To determine the substance abuse profiles of patients treated a Drug Addiction Research, Treatment, and Education Center (AMATEM) in association with the percentage of substance use distribution and multiple substance use in their urine samples. For this, we retrospectively evaluated the urine sample analysis reports of 600 male and female patients aged 13 to 65 years who were treated at the AMATEM unit of İstanbul Neuropsychiatry Hospital between January 1^st, 2015, and December 12^th, 2015.

Materials and methods: The urine samples were sent to Üsküdar University Advanced Toxicology Analysis Laboratory and were analyzed using a UPLC tandem mass spectrometer (UPLC-MS/MS). To determine the substance use profiles of the patients applying to AMATEM, statistical assessment was performed on the analysis reports of the patients.

Results: When the analysis reports of the 600 urine samples were examined, 293 patients were identified to have used addictive substances. The substances most frequently detected in the urine samples were respectively: cannabis, alcohol, morphine, cocaine, synthetic cannabinoids, 3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine, and amphetamine.

Conclusion: The findings in our study resemble the rates of cannabis use by the young population throughout the world. Our results show differences to the literature regarding the consumption of synthetic cannabinoids because the variety of synthetic cannabinoids change rapidly around the world each year.