Healthcare seeking among Swedish patients in opioid substitution treatment - a mixed methods study on barriers and facilitators.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Patients in opioid substitution treatment (OST) have poorer health than the general population. Thus, they do not seek somatic health care to the extent that is medically motivated. Barriers hindering patients from seeking medical help through the conventional healthcare system result in a high degree of unmet healthcare needs. Barriers to, and facilitators of, OST patients' healthcare seeking have been sparsely examined.

Methods

Mixed methods were employed. The quantitative part consisted of a cross-sectional questionnaire covering questions on physical health, healthcare seeking, and barriers thereof, which was collected from 209 patients in OST. A sub-sample of eleven OST patients participated in semi-structured interviews, for the qualitative part of the study

SUBMITTER: Troberg K 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8817477 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature