{"id":2680,"date":"2025-08-10T01:43:32","date_gmt":"2025-08-10T01:43:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tcysapc.org\/?p=2680"},"modified":"2025-08-10T01:43:32","modified_gmt":"2025-08-10T01:43:32","slug":"samhsa-survey-shows-four-years-of-mental-health-substance-use-trends","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tcysapc.org\/?p=2680","title":{"rendered":"SAMHSA Survey Shows Four Years of Mental Health, Substance Use Trends"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"\"The 2024 National Survey on Drug Use and Health<\/a> shows that key substance use and mental health outcome measures are improving, but experts say there is still significant work to do.\u00a0 Over the past four years, most key mental health and substance use outcome measures\u2014such as suicide attempts among adolescents and past-month prescription opioid misuse\u2013either improved or stayed the same, according to the 2024 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), which the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) released this week<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Improvements Among Mental Health Outcomes<\/h2>\n
The 2024 NSDUH highlighted some significant improvements in youth mental health. The percentage of youth ages 12 to 17 who had a major depressive episode in the past year declined from 20.8% in 2021 to 15.4% in 2024.<\/div>\n
\nAdditionally:<\/div>\n
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\u2022\u00a0 \u00a0The percentage who had serious thoughts of suicide in the past year declined from 12.9% to 10.1%.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\u2022\u00a0 \u00a0The percentage who made a suicide plan in the past year declined from 6.2% to 4.6%.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\u2022\u00a0 \u00a0The percentage who attempted suicide in the past year declined from 3.6% to 2.7%.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
In one of the few worsening trends, the percentage of adults who made a suicide plan increased from 1.4% in 2021 to 1.8% in 2024, with the rise being driven by adults ages 26 and older. The rates of suicidal thoughts (5.5%) and attempted suicide (0.8%) remained unchanged in 2024.<\/div>\n
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Substance Use Findings<\/h3>\n

Between 2021 and 2024, some substance use measures improved. Past-year cocaine use dropped from 1.7% to 1.5%, while past-year prescription opioid misuse fell from 3% to 2.6%. Past-year methamphetamine use, past-year prescription stimulant misuse, and past-year opioid use disorder remained unchanged.<\/p>\n

There were also areas where substance use trends worsened. Past-year hallucinogen use rose from 2.7% in 2021 to 3.6% in 2024, while past-year cannabis use rose from 19% to 22.3%. There was also a corresponding rise in cannabis use disorder, from 6% in 2021 to 7.1% in 2024.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re making some progress, but the scale of this problem is vastly under-appreciated,\u201d Busch said. When extrapolating NSDUH data to the national population, 48.4 million people ages 12 years and older had a past-year SUD (and that doesn\u2019t include tobacco products).<\/p>\n

\u201cThis should be an all-hands-on-deck, national initiative. Right now, we have nearly 50 million people with an SUD<\/strong>, yet we don\u2019t really have any national plan on how we\u2019re going to manage it,\u201d said Gerald Busch, M.D., M.P.H., a member of APA\u2019s Council on Addiction Psychiatry, assistant professor of psychiatry at the Uniform Services University of the Health Sciences, and faculty on the Child and Family Behavioral Health Services Unit at Tripler Army Medical Center.. \u201cWe don\u2019t have an organized treatment infrastructure. Screening for substance use disorders in all clinics, dissemination of evidence-based psychosocial interventions, and standardized prevention efforts are in dire need. Paradoxically, we\u2019re cutting back services.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The 2024 National Survey on Drug Use and Health shows that key substance use and mental health outcome measures are improving, but experts say there is still significant work to do.\u00a0 Over the past four years, most key mental health … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2680","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t