Predictors of repeated emergency department visits among persons treated for addiction.

Background/aims: To determine whether frequent emergency department (ED) users who enter specialized treatment programs for alcohol and/or drug problems have any characteristics that predict their future ED use.

Methods: Adult patients (783 alcohol users, 405 illicit drug users) were interviewed. Data from the medical database on utilization of ED and the emergency departments' specific units for addictive diseases (EDAD) 12 months before and 12 months after the interview were linked with patient characteristics in logistic regression models.

Receiving an alcohol enquiry from a physician in routine health care in Sweden: a population-based study of gender differences and predictors.

Research has shown that the provision of brief interventions in the health care system is effective for reducing hazardous drinking. Using a telephone-administered questionnaire, this study provides a population-based investigation on the extent to which physicians address patients' alcohol habits in the Swedish health care system, whether there are gender differences in the extent to which patients receive questions about alcohol, and predictors for receiving such questions. Data were obtained from monthly telephone surveys with around 72,000 people in 2006-2009.

Is the population level link between drinking and harm similar for women and men?--a time series analysis with focus on gender-specific drinking and alcohol-related hospitalizations in Sweden.

Background: A question that has not been addressed in the literature is whether the population level association between alcohol and harm differs between men and women. The main aim of this article is to fill this gap by analysing recently collected time series data of male and female self-reported drinking in relation to gender-specific harm indicators in Sweden.

Methods: Male and female per capita and risk consumption was estimated on the basis of self-reported data from monthly alcohol surveys for the period 2002-07.

Were the changes to Sweden's maintenance treatment policy 2000-06 related to changes in opiate-related mortality and morbidity?

Aims: To analyse whether changes in maintenance treatment of opiate-dependent subjects in Sweden were related to changes in opiate-related mortality and inpatient care from 1998 to 2006.

Design: We collected data from surveys of methadone maintenance treatment units, of buprenorphine and methadone sales, and of mortality and inpatient care in Sweden.

Setting: Sweden.