The prevalence of pre-existing mental health, drug and alcohol conditions in major trauma patients

Abstract

Objective Capturing information about mental health, drug and alcohol conditions in injury datasets is important for improving understanding of injury risk and outcome. This study describes the prevalence of pre-existing mental health, drug and alcohol conditions in major trauma patients based on routine discharge data coding. Methods Data were extracted from the population-based Victorian State Trauma Registry (July 2005 to June 2013, n = 16 096). Results Seventeen percent of major trauma patients had at least one mental health condition compared with the Australian population prevalence of 21%. The prevalence of mental health conditions was similar to the Australian population prevalence in men (19% v. 18%), but lower in women (14% v. 25%) and across all age groups. Mental health conditions were more prevalent in intentional self-harm cases (56.3%) compared with unintentional (13.8%) or other intentional (31.2%) cases. Substance use disorders were more prevalent in major trauma patients than the general population (15% v. 5%), higher in men than women (17% v. 10%) and was highest in young people aged 25–34 years (24%). Conclusions Under-reporting of mental health conditions in hospital discharge data appears likely, reducing the capacity to characterise the injury population. Further validation is needed. What is known about the topic? Medical record review, routine hospital discharge data and self-report have been used by studies previously to characterise mental health, drug and alcohol conditions in injured populations, with medical record review considered the most accurate and reliance on self-report measures being considered at risk of recall bias. The use of routinely collected data sources provides an efficient and standardised method of characterising pre-existing conditions, but may underestimate the true prevalence of conditions. What does this paper add? No study to date has explored the prevalence of Abbreviated Injury Scale and International Classification of Diseases and Health Related Problems, Tenth Revision, Australian Modification (ICD-10-a.m)-coded mental health, alcohol and drug conditions in seriously injured populations. The results of this study show the incidence of mental health conditions appeared to be under-reported in major trauma patients, suggesting limitations in the use of ICD-10-a.m. to measure mental health comorbidities. What are the implications for practitioners? In order to achieve improvements in measuring mental health, drug and alcohol comorbidities, we suggest the use of a series of different diagnostic systems to be used in conjunction with ICD-10-a.m., such as medical record review and self-reporting as well as linkage to other datasets. When applied simultaneously, diagnosis and outcomes of mental health may be compared and validated across diagnostic systems and deviations in diagnoses could be more readily accounted for.