Substance use and acquired brain injury

Pearson, Corinne (2005) Substance use and acquired brain injury. University of Southampton, Doctoral Thesis.

Record type: Thesis (Doctoral)

Abstract

The first section of this thesis presents a review on substance use and brain injury. The review identifies that a large percentage of individuals following brain injury are likely to use substances, both pre and post injury. This substance use can have an impact on rehabilitation and outcome. Therefore, this issue must be considered by clinicians working in the field of brain injury. There is limited evidence regarding treatment programmes, particularly in the UK. There has been no investigation into known predictors of relapse from the field of addictions such as cognitive flexibility and employment status. The study presented in the second part of the thesis aims to investigate the relationship between post-injury alcohol use and cognitive flexibility, post-injury productivity, pre-injury alcohol use and time since injury. A significant association was found between pre- and post-injury alcohol use, with trends towards significance with cognitive flexibility and post-injury productivity. However, these indices did not vary significantly for those identified as ‘at risk’ or ‘not at risk’. Regression analysis identified that pre-injury drinking and time since injury were significant predictors of post-injury drinking risk. The results indicate that brain injury services need to assess for alcohol use and to consider follow up procedures after discharge. More research is recommended investigating what other factors may contribute to this risk as time increases following the injury. In addition, it is recommended that time is spent examining the efficacy of treatment of alcohol use following brain injury, for example using modified CBT.

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