R. Sallemi

Profile of Tunisian Population of Drug Addicts

Introduction In Tunisia, the number of drug addicts seems toincrease and this addiction is considered as a complex psychiatric disorderwith a chronic relapsing course. Objective to describe the socio-demographic and clinicalprofile of drug addict patients. Methods This consisted on a cross-sectional and descriptive study. Data were collected from the files of 30 men hospitalized at the drug abuse prevention center ‘ATUPRET ‘of Sfax in Tunisia, during the month of September and October 2014. Results The average age of patients was 33,6 years (19-59 years). They were single in 66.7%. Their school leveldidn’t exceed the secondary one in 80% of cases and they didn’t have any occupation in 30% ofcases. Theaverage age of onsetof drug use was21.3 years (14-52years) and the average duration of drug use was 11.9 years (1-43 years). Curiosity was the most commonly reported reasonfor initiating drug use (36, 7%). It was commonly a polytoxicomania (63%). The most widely used substances were cannabis (56, 7%) and subutex (46,7%). Nearly half of subutex addictsused to shoot it (42, 3%) and the average daily dose was 5, 28 mg. A comorbide affective disorder was found in16.7% of addict patients. Conclusion A young single men with no profession and a limitededucational attainment, such is the profile most frequently encountered amongdrug addicts in our study. Those social characteristics and the presence ofunderlying affective disorders should be considered in the management of suchpatients.