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Patterns of drug use and associated harms among rural injecting drug users: Comparisons with metropolitan injecting drug users
Author(s) -
Day Carolyn,
Conroy Elizabeth,
Lowe Julia,
Page Jude,
Dolan Kate
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
australian journal of rural health
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.48
H-Index - 49
eISSN - 1440-1584
pISSN - 1038-5282
DOI - 10.1111/j.1440-1584.2006.00775.x
Subject(s) - medicine , metropolitan area , syringe , drug , heroin , environmental health , rural area , family medicine , psychiatry , pathology
Objective: Given the harms associated with injecting drug use to both individuals and community and the paucity of such data from rural areas, the study aimed to compare: patterns of drug use, harms, and service access and utilisation among rural and metropolitan injecting drug users (IDU).Design: Cross‐sectional survey, using interviewer‐administered structured questionnaire.Participants: One hundred and sixty‐four rural and 96 metropolitan IDU from seven different New South Wales Area Health Services, recruited through needle and syringe programs (NSPs), snowballing techniques and advertisement.Results: Age, gender, education and employment were similar for rural and metropolitan participants. Both samples reported use of a range of drugs, but rural participants were less likely than metropolitan participants to report daily heroin use (2% vs 10%), but more likely to report having injected morphine (50% vs 21%) in the last six months. Similar proportions reported using a needle/syringe after another person. Rural participants were less likely to report use of NSPs (36% vs 80%) and reported a number of barriers to NSP access and also to drug treatment services. Rural participants reported a significantly longer period of time between blood‐borne virus testing.Conclusion: Samples of rural IDU are similar to metropolitan, although report some differences in patterns of drug use. Service provision, including access to new injecting equipment, blood‐borne virus testing and drug treatment was found to cause considerable problems for rural IDU. These issues warrant further consideration.