Psychiatric Assessment for a Sample of Wives of Opioid Addiction

S. Micheal, Victor; Abd-Elmaksoud, Shorouk F.; K. Farag, Ahmed; T. El Bakry, Shewikar

doi:10.21608/EJPSY.2025.406243

Psychiatric Assessment for a Sample of Wives of Opioid Addiction

Authors

¹ Department of Neuropsychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, Benha University, Cairo, Egypt.

² Department of Psychiatry, Benha University, Benha, Egypt.

³ Department of Neuropsychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, Benha University, Cairo, Egypt

10.21608/EJPSY.2025.406243

Abstract

Background
Substance addiction affects the functioning of the family, the community, and the relatives of substance abusers, as they experience considerable burden of care. The presence of a substance-dependent family member increases conflicts and causes stress to every member of the family.
The aim of the study was to assess psychiatric disorders among wives of opioid abusers and find out the relation between such disorders and the factors related to husband’s addiction.
Procedure
A total of 97 wives of opioid addicts were included in a study at El-Maamoura Hospital for mental health. SCID I was performed for all wives. Full drug screening and the addiction severity index were performed for husbands. The socioeconomic test scale was answered by any of the spouses.
Results
This study was conducted on 97 wives of opioid addicts. Approximately 49.5% experienced recent psychiatric disorders, as 18.5% of the wives had a dysthymic disorder, 13.4% had major depressive disorders, 6.1% had anxiety disorders, and 10.2% had hypochondriasis. Among the wives of opioid addicts, a significant relation between having a psychiatric disorder and a family history and a highly significant relation between having a psychiatric disorder and the addiction severity of their husbands were recorded by the regression analysis.
Conclusions
Opioid dependence of a male patient was associated with wife’s mental health; the majority of them experienced psychiatric disorders, ranging from a dysthymic disorder, major depressive disorders, anxiety disorders, to hypochondriasis. Among the wives of opioid addicts, there was a significant relation between having a psychiatric disorder and a family history and the addiction severity of their husbands.

Keywords