Self-efficacy, psychological distress and previous therapy as predictors of abstinence after inpatient treatment - a replication study

Question: Can abstinence at follow-up after one year be predicted based on the number of previous detoxifcations, depressiveness and self-efficacy expectations? Method: Prospective replication field study in another clinic in which differences between the characteristics of consistently abstinent (N = 285) and relapsed (N = 274) alcohol-dependent patients at one-year follow-up were analyzed with binary logistic regression and Chi square tests. Results: As in our previous study, age, gender, education, unemployment, marital status, partner situation, addiction-specific and pyschological comorbidity were not prognostically relevant. The only relevant factor was personality disorders. On the other hand, patients with fewer than two detoxifications and high self-efficacy expectations were most likely to have been consistently abstinent for a year (82 %). It was also confirmed that a reduction in psychological distress does not correlate with abstinence. Depressiveness and previous treatments were not replicated as predictors. Conclusions: Previous detoxifications, self-efficacy expectations and personality disorders could be generally applicable predictors at the type of clinic studied here. The extent to which the exclusion of the two predictors depressiveness and previous treatment is due to new interventions for depressed patients and patients who have had previous treatment should be investigated. As in our previous study, in spite of low explained variance and medium effect size, the regression model enables causal hypotheses to be derived for the improvement of clinic-specific treatment. Replication studies as well as empirical studies should be an integral element of behavioural therapy planning.