As substance abuse and health professionals we hear a lot about co-occurring mental health and substance use, but not much about co-occurring mental health and substance use PREVENTION.
For example, SAMHSA just released a new brief on the negative outcomes associated with co-occurring mental health and substance use disorders (COD) and the need for evidence-based integrated care.
What’s lacking, however, is equal attention to negative outcomes associated with substance use and other health risk behaviors which often co-occur or cluster yet influence mental health, including physical inactivity, poor nutrition, lack of sleep and uncontrolled stress.
Together these behaviors are interconnected and influence each other toward either greater or lesser mental and physical health, performance and happiness of young people.
Given that non-substance use risk behaviors are even more prominent among youth and are linked to greater mental illness, they should be addressed along with substance use in integrated evidence-based prevention interventions.
Unfortunately, prevention and early intervention are often too exclusionary in terms of targeting the prevention of substance use alone and the focus on risk factors for substance use.
Prevention and early intervention are in great need for transformational change.
This change should include greater inclusion by targeting substance use prevention along integrating the promotion of protective healthy habits including physical activity and sports, health breakfast and food consumption, sleep quality and quantity, and stress control habits for protecting and promoting the greater mental and physical wellbeing of youth and young adults in America.
Integrated substance use and healthy behavior promotion prevention programs are critically need to cost-effectively address co-occurring health risk habits of youth and enhance prevention intervention outcome breadth.
Learn more about integrated prevention and wellness interventions: https://preventionpluswellness.com