1. Past 30-Day Marijuana Use Categories
Is Marijuana Being Used to Cope with Psychological Distress:
Results from 2016 National HIV Behavioral Surveillance System
Emery Shekiro, MPH,1 Alia Al-Tayyib, PhD1 , Kathryn DeYoung, MS1
Denver Public Health, Denver, CO
Background & Aims
Results
Results
There is growing evidence that people with mental health disorders are more likely to use marijuana or to have used it in the past.
We sought to explore the association between self-reported non-specific psychological distress (NSPD) and marijuana use.
This analysis will help to determine potential areas of focus to better understand the relationship between poor mental health outcomes and marijuana use.
Figure 3. Crude and Adjusted Odds Between Psychological Distress and Marijuana Use
Associations Between Covariates and Past 30-Day MJ Use:
Figure 1. Past 30-Day Marijuana Use Among Heterosexuals at Increased Risk for HIV
Characteristic
Total N(Col%)
Total
392
Age
18-21
21 (5)
22-30
93 (24)
31-40
75 (19)
41-50
90 (23)
51-60
113 (29)
Gender
Male
144 (37)
Female
248 (63)
Race/Ethnicity
White, Non-Hispanic
17 (4)
Black, Non-Hispanic
116 (30)
Hispanic
259 (66)
Methods
Between July and December of 2016, heterosexuals at increased risk for HIV infection were recruited using respondent-driven sampling as part of the National HIV Behavior Surveillance system (NHBS) survey conducted in Denver, Colorado.
Inclusion criteria were:
Between the ages of 18 and 60
Reported sexual contact with opposite sex
Resided in the Denver metro area
Low socioeconomic status
Participants answered questions regarding:
HIV risk factors
Past 30-day marijuana (MJ) use
Past 30-day psychological distress (Kessler- 6 (K6))
Past 30-day MJ use was categorized into four groups:
The Kessler-6 contains six questions that ask about feelings experienced during the past month: sad, nervous, restless or fidgety, hopeless, everything is an effort, worthless.
Questions were scored on a five-point Likert scale ranging from none of the time to all of the time.
Psychological distress scores were then categorized into three groups:
Having moderate and severe distress was associated with a 1.7 fold increase in the odds of marijuana use across each transition in category (CI:1.15,2.49).
After adjusting for age, race, and gender, the odds of heavy MJ use among those with moderate-severe psychological distress was 1.9 (CI:1.28,2.89).
Feeling nervous ( p= 0.001), feeling sad (p=0.006), and feeling everything is an effort (p=0.03) were all significantly related to past 30-day marijuana use.
N(Col%)
51% of the sample used marijuana in the past 30-days; 27% of the sample reported heavy marijuana use (5-7 days a week) in the past 30-days.
61% of the sample had moderate-severe NSPD.
Moderate-severe NSPD was most common among females, those years old, and Hispanics.
Conclusions
Crude Associations Between Non-Specific Psychological Distress and MJ Use:
There is a high prevalence of psychological distress and concurrent marijuana use among this sample.
The results suggest there is an association between past 30-day NSPD and past 30-day marijuana use among heterosexuals at increased risk for HIV.
The association between marijuana use and psychological distress should be further explored in terms of chronology, health implications, and impact of marijuana on acute and long-term distress.
Figure 2. Prevalence of Past 30-Day Marijuana Use, Stratified by Psychological Distress
Past 30-Day Marijuana Use Categories
None
Occasional
Regular
Heavy
0 days
< weekly
1-4 days a week
5-7 days a week
Limitations
Not a representative sample of Denver due to intentional oversampling of specific race/ethnicities and age groups.
Funding
Past 30-day NSPD was associated with past 30-day marijuana use.
About 60% of the sample with moderate-severe NSPD used marijuana in the past 30-days.
Past 30-day regular marijuana use among participants with no-low NSPD was significantly different from regular marijuana use among participants with moderate-severe NSPD.
This study was supported in part by an appointment to the Applied Epidemiology Fellowship Program administered by the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists (CSTE) and funded through the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Cooperative Agreement Number 1U38OT by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
This study was supported by funding from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention (5U1BPS003251).
K6 Score
Level of Psychological Distress
0 to 4
Low or no risk
5 to 12
Moderate risk
13 to 24
Severe risk
Contact Information: For more information, please contact Emery Shekiro at
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