Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-xfwgj Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-15T04:29:38.889Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Self-reported psychotropic drug use and associated factors in a French community sample

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 July 2009

P. Pariente*
Affiliation:
INSERM Unit 169; Hôpital Bichat, Paris, France
J. P. Lépine
Affiliation:
INSERM Unit 169; Hôpital Bichat, Paris, France
J. Lellouch
Affiliation:
INSERM Unit 169; Hôpital Bichat, Paris, France
*
1 Address for correspondence: Dr Philip Pariente, INSERM Unit 169, 16 Avenue Paul-Vaillant Couturier, 94807 Villejuif Cédex, France.

Synopsis

Drug use was examined in a French general population adult sample from a household survey conducted in 1987–8 in a newly built town near Paris. Psychotropic drug use was measured by the percentage of subjects reporting their use during the past week. It was prominently represented by benzodiazepines (90% of psychotropic users), differed strongly between genders (4·6% in men, 10·2% in women) and age groups (higher after 40 years). A lifetime history of major depressive episode (MDE) or of anxiety disorders was associated with a higher proportion of psychotropic drug use. Psychotropic drug use also went with a current well-being questionnaire score. Using a logistic analysis, the following set of variables held for women: well-being score, history of both MDE and anxiety disorder, age, and marital status. Making allowance for the cross-sectional nature of this retrospective survey, these finding confirmed the relatively high level of benzodiazepine drug use in an urban French community sample and emphasized its association with mental health status.

Type
Original Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1992

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Referemces

Allgulander, C. (1989). Psychoactive drug use in a general population sample, Sweden; correlates with perceived health, psychiatric diagnoses, and mortality in an automated record-linkage study. American Journal of Public Health 79, 10061010.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Balter, M. B., Levine, J. & Manheimer, D. I. (1974 a). Cross-national study of the extent of anxiety/sedative drug use. New England Journal of Medicine 290, 769774.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Balter, M. B., Levine, J. & Manheimer, D. I. (1974 b). Reply to Maronde and Silverman. New England Journal of Medicine 290, 1491.Google Scholar
Burman, M. A., Hough, R. L., Escobar, J. I., Karno, M., Timbers, D. M., Telles, C. A. & Locke, B. Z. (1987). Six-month prevalence of specific psychiatric disorders among Mexican Americans and non-Hispanic whites in Los Angeles. Archives of General Psychiatry 44, 687694.Google Scholar
Chaiton, A., Spitzer, W. O., Roberts, R. S. & Delmore, T. (1976). Patterns of medical drug use – a community focus. Canadian Medical Association Journal 114, 33.Google ScholarPubMed
Cooperstock, R. (1978). Sex differences in psychotropic drug use. Social Science and Medicine 12, 179186.Google ScholarPubMed
Cooperstock, R. & Parnell, P. (1982). Research on psychotropic drug use: a review of findings and methods. Social Science and Medicine 16, 11791196.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Craig, T. J. & Van Natta, P. A. (1978). Current medication use and symptoms of depression in a general population. American Journal of Psychiatry 135, 10361039.Google ScholarPubMed
Dunbar, G. C., Perera, M. H. & Jenner, F. A. (1989). Patterns of benzodiazepine use in Great Britain as measured by a general population survey. British Journal of Psychiatry 155, 836841.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dunnell, K. & Cartwright, A. (1972). Medicine Takers, Prescribers and Hoarders. Routledge and Kegan Paul: London.Google Scholar
Dupuy, H. J. (1972). The Psychological Section of the Current Health and Nutrition Examination Survey: Procedures of the Public Health Conference on Records and Statistics jointly with the National Conference on Health Statistics.National Center for Health Statistics,June 1972:Washington, D. C.Google Scholar
Fejer, D. & Samrt, R. (1973). The use of psychoactive drugs by adults. Canadian Psychiatric Association Journal 18, 313.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Féline, A. & Le Goc, I. (1985). Les benzodiazépines: prescription, consommation, addiction. Semaine Hôpitaux Paris 45, 31713177.Google Scholar
Gabe, J. & Williams, P. (1986). Tranquilliser use: a historical perspective. In Tranquillisers: Social, Psychological and Clinical Perspectives (ed. Gabe, J. and Williams, P.), pp. 328341. Tavistock: London.Google Scholar
Godard, A. & Regnauld, M. H. (1986). Godard, A. & Regnauld, M. H. (1986). Consommation de psychotropes. Revue Française de Santé Publique 33, 512.Google Scholar
Greenblalt, D. J., Shader, R. I. & Koch-Weser, J. (1975). Psychotropic drug use in the Boston area. Archives of General Psychiatry 32, 518521.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Group de Réflexion (1990). Rapport du Groupe de Réflexion sur l'utilisation des hypnotiques et des tranquillisants en France. SNIP, Paris.Google Scholar
Hemminki, E. (1975). Review of the literature on the factors affecting drug prescribing. Social Science and Medicine 9, 111115.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hosmer, D. & Lemeshow, S. (1989). Applied Logistic Regression. p. 307. Wiley & Sons, New York.Google Scholar
Isacson, D. & Haglund, B. (1988). Psychotropic drug use in a Swedish community: the importance of demographic and socioeconomic factors. Social Science and Medicine 26, 477483.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Isacson, D. & Smedby, B. (1988). Patterns of psychotropic drug use in a Swedish community. Scandinavian Journal of Primary Health Care 6, 5158.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Isacson, D., Carsjö, K., Haglund, B. & Smedby, B. (1988). Psychotropic drug use in a Swedish community: patterns of individual use during 2 years. Social Science and Medicine 27, 263267.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Joyce, P. R., Oakley-Browne, M. A., Wells, J. E., Bushnell, J. A. & Hornblow, A. R. (1990). Birth cohort trends in major depression: increasing rates and earlier onset in New Zealand. Journal of Affective Disorders 18, 8389.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Koenig, W., Ruther, E., Remmers, A. & Filipiak, B. (1987). Psychotropic drug utilisation patterns in a metropolitan population. European Journal of Clinical Pharmacology 32, 4351.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lader, M. (1978). Benzodiazepines – the opium of the masses? Neuroscience 3, 159.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Laurier, C., Dumas, J. & Gregoire, J. P. (1990). Enquête Santé- Québec: Facteurs liés à l'utilisation des benzodiazépines.Communication au Vème Congrès de la Fédération Internationale d'Epidémiologie Psychiatrique.Montréal,juin 1990.Google Scholar
Lecomte, Th. (1986). Evolution de la consommation pharmaceutique 1970–1980. Revue Française de Santé Publique 33, 4955.Google Scholar
Lépine, J. P., Lellouch, J., Lovell, A., Teherani, M., Ha, C., Verdier-Taillefer, M. H., Rambourg, N. & Lemperiére, T. (1989). Anxiety and depressive disorders in a French population: methodology and preliminary results. Psychiatry & Psychobiology 4, 267274.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marc, N. & Marchand, O. (1984). La population active de 1975 à 1982: les facteurs d'une forte croissance. Economic et Statistique 171–172.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maronde, M. F. & Silverman, M. (1974). Drug use as determined by interviews. New England Journal of Medicine 290, 1491.Google ScholarPubMed
Mellinger, G. D., Balter, M. B. & Manheimer, D. I. (1971). Patterns of Psychotherapeutic drug use among adults in San Francisco. Archives of General Psychiatry 25, 385394.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Mellinger, G. D., Balter, M. B.Manheimer, D. I., Cisin, I. H. & Parry, H. J. (1978). Psychic distress, life crisis, and use of psychotherapeutic medications: national household survey data. Archives of General Psychiatry 35, 10451052.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Murray, J., Dunn, G., Williams, P. & Tarnopolsky, A. (1981). Factors affecting the consumption of psychotropic drugs. Psychological Medicine 11, 551560.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ormel, J. (1983). Neuroticism and well-being inventories: measuring traits or states. Psychological Medicine 13, 165176.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Pakesch, G., Loimer, N.Rasinger, E., Tutsch, G. & Katschnig, H. (1989). The prevalence of psychoactive drug intake in a metropolitan population. Pharmacopsychiatry 22, 6165.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Parry, H. J., Balter, M. B., & Cisin, I. H. (1970). Primary levels of underreporting psychotropic drug use. Public Opinion Quarterly 34, 582592.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Parry, H. J., Balter, M. B., Mellinger, G. B., Cisin, I. H. & Manheimer, D. I. (1973). National patterns of psychotherapeutic drug use. Archives of General Psychiatry 28, 769783.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Power, B., Downey, W. & Schnell, B. R. (1983). Utilization of psychotropic drug use in Saskatchewan: 1977–1980. Canadian Journal of Psychiatry 28, 547551.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Robins, L. N., Wing, J., Wittchen, H. U., Helzer, J. E., Babor, T. F., Burke, J., Farmer, A., Jablensky, A., Pickens, R., Regier, D. A., Sartorius, N. & Towle, L. H. (1988). The Composite International Diagnostic Interview: an epidemiologic instrument suitable for use in conjunction with different diagnostic systems and in different cultures. Archives of General Psychiatry 45, 10691077.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rush, B., Simmons, M., Birchmore Timney, C., Evans, J. & Finlay, R. (1987). A comparison of psychotropic drug use between the general population and clients of health and social service agencies. International Journal of the Addictions 22, 843859.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Santé-Québec (1988) ‘Et la Santé, ça va?’ Rapport de l'enquête Santé-Québec 1987. Les Publications du Québec: Québec, Canada.Google Scholar
SAS Institute Inc. (1985). SAS Procedures Guide for Personal Computers, version 6 edition. SAS Institute: Cary, NC.Google Scholar
Siciliani, O., Bellantuono, C., Williams, P. & Tansella, M. (1985). Self-reported use of psychotropic drugs and alcohol abuse in South Verona. Psychological Medicine 15, 821826.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tyrer, P., Murphy, S. & Riley, P. (1990). The Benzodiazepine Withdrawal Symptom Questionnaire. Journal of Affective Disorders 19, 5361.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Uhlenhuth, E. H., Balter, M. B. & Lipman, R. S. (1978). Minor tranquillisers: clinical correlates of use in an urban population. Archives of General Psychiatry 35, 650655.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vázquez-Barquero, J. L., Diez-Manrique, J. F., Arenal-Gonzalez, A., Cuesta, M. J. & Artal, J. A. (1989). Patterns of psychotropic drug use in a Spanish rural community. British Journal of Psychiatry 55, 633641.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vidal, (1988). Dictionnaire Vidal des spécialités médicales. Editions du Vidal: Paris.Google Scholar
Warheit, G. J., Arey, S. A. & Swanson, E. (1976). Patterns of drug use: an epidemiologic overview. Journal of Drug Issues 6, 223.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Williams, P. (1978). Physical ill-health and psychotropic drug prescription: a review. Psychological Medicine 8, 683693.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Williams, P. & Gabe, J. (1989). Tranquilliser use: epidemiological and sociological aspects. In The Scope of Epidemiological Psychiatry (ed. Williams, P., Wilkinson, G. and Rawnsley, K.), pp. 329341. Tavistock: London.Google Scholar
Wittchen, H. U. & Essau, C. A. (1989). Comorbidity of anxiety disorders and depression: does it affect course and outcome? Psychiatry and Psychobiology 4, 315323.CrossRefGoogle Scholar