Content area
Full Text
Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol (2015) 50:713724 DOI 10.1007/s00127-014-0980-3
ORIGINAL PAPER
Nonmedical prescription drug use among US young adults by educational attainment
Silvia S. Martins June H. Kim Lian-Yu Chen
Deysia Levin Katherine M. Keyes
Magdalena Cerd Carla L. Storr
Received: 19 May 2014 / Accepted: 10 November 2014 / Published online: 27 November 2014 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2014
AbstractPurpose Little is known about nonmedical use of prescription drugs among non-college-attending young adults in the United States.
Methods Data were drawn from 36,781 young adults (ages 1822 years) from the 20082010 National Survey on Drug Use and Health public use les. The adjusted main effects for current educational attainment, along with its interaction with gender and race/ethnicity, were considered.
Results Compared to those attending college, non-college-attending young adults with at least and less than a HS degree had a higher prevalence of past-year nonmedical use of prescription opioids [NMUPO 13.1 and 13.2 %, respectively, vs. 11.3 %, adjusted odds ratios (aORs) 1.21(1.111.33) and 1.25 (1.121.40)], yet lower prevalence of prescription stimulant use. Among users, regardless of drug type, non-college-attending youth were more likely to have past-year disorder secondary to use [e.g., NMUPO 17.4 and19.1 %, respectively, vs. 11.7 %, aORs 1.55 (1.221.98) and 1.75 (1.352.28)]. Educational attainment interacted with gender and race: (1) among nonmedical users of prescription opioids, females who completed high school but were not enrolled in college had a signicantly greater
risk of opioid disorder (compared to female college students) than the same comparison for men; and (2) the risk for nonmedical use of prescription opioids was negligible across educational attainment groups for Hispanics, which was signicantly different than the increased risk shown for non-Hispanic whites.
Conclusions There is a need for young adult prevention and intervention programs to target nonmedical prescription drug use beyond college campuses.
Keywords Nonmedical prescription drug use Drug use
disorders Educational attainment Young adults Gender
differences
Introduction
Nonmedical prescription drug useuse without a prescription or use with a prescription but in a manner other than how prescribedis the fastest growing drug problem in the US [1], driven primarily by nonmedical use of prescription opioids (NMUPO) among younger cohorts [2]. While a large proportion of young adults (age 1822) are prescribed opiates (PO) and stimulants for legitimate health conditions...