Dropout of drug addicts treatment: prevalence and associated factors identified from the active surveillance of patients

Abstract Introduction Drug addiction is considered a heterogeneous etiology disorder, there are guidelines for their treatment, but still there is a high drop out rate. The research has the purpose to identify the prevalence and associated factors to the abandonment of the treatment. Methods Cross-sectional study, with a review of 593 medical records and 30 interviews applied to patients who had not adhered to treatment in a substance abuse clinic in a municipality located in southern Rio Grande do Sul. Results The dropout rate was 82%. The treatment time (Coef = –0.14, SE = 0.08; OR = 0.9), treatment with the social worker (Coef = –0.68, SE = 0.33, OR = 0.5) and psychological treatment (Coef = –0.66, SE = 0.44, OR = 0.5) decreased to the likelihood of abandonment. The most frequently reported reason in the interviews to justify the abandonment was the service’s opening hours coinciding with working hours (33%, n = 10). Conclusion It is necessary to pay attention to the evasion phenomenon in order to provide alternatives to increasing compliance and the return of these patients.