SY23-3 * DEVELOPMENT OF RESEARCH IN SUBSTANCE USE DISORDERS IN THE DEPARTMENT OF PSYCHIATRY, SIRIRAJ HOSPITAL

Abstract

According to the comparative risk assessment study in 2009, alcohol abuse and smoking are the top two-ranked risk behaviors among Thai males, with an uprising trend for both genders since 2004. Overall, the number of patients with substance use disorders increased continuously. This emphasizes the dire need for the development of services and research focusing on substance use disorders. Addiction is one of the areas of research excellence in our department. The psychiatric and special clinics for substance use problems of the psychiatric department has set up research teams and performed various studies, including analysis of services provided, prevalence survey studies, validation of instruments and controlled trial. In this symposium, I will highlight the progress of research projects related to alcohol, tobacco and amphetamine use disorders that has been carried out in the department of psychiatry in our hospital. Albeit limited resources, we aim to develop more advance research in addiction, including biological research and genetic association studies, with various inter-departmental and multi-center collaboration. Furthermore, we hope that we can apply the knowledge obtained from these studies to continuously improve our services for the management of addiction.