Medical and licit drug use in an urban/rural study population with a refugee background, 7-8 years into resettlement.

Objective: Research into medical and licit drug use in resettled refugee populations is scarce, despite the fact that mental health status often has been found to be poorer than in general populations. Hence the aim of this study was to estimate the prevalence of self-rated use of medicine and licit drugs among adults who came to Sweden from Bosnia-Herzegovina (1993/94) and who in 2001 were living in either an urban (low employment context) or a rural (high employment context) region (n=4185).

Methods: Prevalence was estimated from a cross-sectional questionnaire distributed to a representative sample (n=650) in 2001 (63.

Mental health, employment and gender. Cross-sectional evidence in a sample of refugees from Bosnia-Herzegovina living in two Swedish regions.

Large regional differences regarding access to employment have been observed amongst persons from Bosnia-Herzegovina coming to Sweden in 1993-1994. This has led to questions about the role of mental health. To explore this further, postal survey questionnaires were distributed to a community sample (N = 650) that was stratified and, within strata, randomly selected from a sampling frame of persons coming to Sweden from Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1993-1994.