Abstract P205: A National Study Examining Association Between Frequency Of Cannabis Use And Demographic, Socioeconomic, And Behavioral Risk Factors

Abstract

Background: Cannabis use is becoming increasingly common. Yet, little is known about the frequency of past month cannabis use and how it is associated with demographic, socioeconomic and behavioral risk factors. Hypothesis: Vulnerable populations will have higher frequency of cannabis use. Individuals that have lower socioeconomic status, and or other behavioral risk factors (e.g. smoking) will have higher frequency of use compared to non-users. Methods: We combined four years (2016-2019), of the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance Survey (BRFSS), a large national survey of adults conducted annually by the CDC. The large sample size (unweighted N = 394,285) allowed the categorization of cannabis use. We examined the distribution of use and categorized past 30 day use into four categories: non-use (0 days, 90.7%), infrequent use (1-5 days, 2.9%), frequent use (6-29 days, 3.0%) and daily use (30 days, 3.3%). The subcategorizations of cannabis use frequency were treated as an ordinal variable. Ordinal logistic regression was performed to examine the association of the frequency of cannabis use with demographics (age, gender race/ethnicity, marital status), socioeconomic (educational attainment, employment status, annual household income), and behavioral (access to legal cannabis, smoking status, e-cigarette use, alcohol use and risky alcohol use) factors. Results: A multivariate ordinal logistic regression analysis showed that being male (Adjusted Odds Ratio (AOR) = 1.51; 95% CI: 1.41, 1.61), black (AOR = 1.55; 95%CI: 1.40, 1.72), unemployed (AOR = 1.19; 95%CI: 1.11-1.29), having access to legal medical (AOR = 1.22; 95%CI: 1.12, 1.32) or recreational (AOR = 2.52; 95%CI: 2.30, 2.76) cannabis, were associated with greater frequency of cannabis consumption. In addition, smoking tobacco (AOR = 2.18; 95%CI: 2.00, 2.37), e-cigarettes use (AOR = 3.51; 95%CI: 3.08, 4.01), past month alcohol use (AOR = 1.96; 95%CI: 1.81, 2.13) and binge drinking (AOR = 1.78; 95%CI: 1.63, 1.94) were also associated with greater frequency of cannabis consumption. Being older (AOR = 0.18; 95%CI: 0.15, 0.20), Asian (AOR = 0.66; 95%CI: 0.55, 0.79), Hispanic (AOR = 0.67; 95%CI: 0.60, 0.75), married (AOR = 0.56; 95%CI: 0.52, 0.60), and higher income (AOR = 0.87; 95%CI: 0.79, 0.97) were all associated with lower frequency of cannabis use. Conclusion: The most salient factors associated with greater frequency of cannabis use had to do with low socioeconomic status, recreational access to cannabis, and use of substances such as cigarette smoking and alcohol consumption. Vulnerable populations had high odds of cannabis use, and frequent cannabis use was associated with health behaviors that increase cardiovascular risk.