ABSTRACT
Treating a patient with coexisting mood and substance use disorders poses a number of serious challenges for clinicians. First, these patients may exhibit a wide variety of symptoms, thus potentially presenting great diagnostic difficulties. Moreover, the treatment of this patient population is complicated by the fact that each of these disorders may alter the course and worsen the prognosis of the other, including increasing the risk of suicide. Fortunately, recent research and clinical experience has led to an increasing body of knowledge focusing on the evaluation and treatment of this heterogeneous group of patients.
