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Table 6 Six outcomes measures for comparison of effectiveness: sources and quantification

From: The political and scientific challenges in evaluating compulsory drug treatment centers in Southeast Asia

Outcome measures

How the outcome measures were sourced and quantified

Comparison of effectiveness

Heroin use

Based on self-reported heroin use at each of the five time-points. The question was ‘During the last 3 months, did you use heroin?’ The answer was ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ (dichotomous outcome variable created in the data set with Yes = 1 and No = 0). Results of urine drug screening were used to validate self-reported heroin use.

Drug-free days (in the preceding 30 days)

The question asked was ‘During the previous 30 days, on average, how many days did you NOT use any illicit drugs?’ The value to this question formed the basis for a continuous outcome variable with the range from 0 to 30 (drug-free days).

Drug-use related illegal behaviors

A list of 6 questions about drug-use related illegal behaviors was asked; each focused on a type of illegal behavior:

a) Using force to get money from other people; b) Fraud; c) Theft; d) Robbery; e) Illicit drug dealing; and f) Assault, physical flight to get money to buy illicit drugs. A dichotomous variable (Yes/No) was created for this outcome measure with all illegal behaviors combined.

Drug-used related BBV risk behaviors

The BBV-TRAQ-SV [46] was used to create data for this outcome measure. Answers to all questions were counted and a single summary score was calculated.

Overdose incident

The question was ‘Did you experience any overdose incident during the previous 3 months?’ A dichotomous outcome variable was created with Yes = 1 and No = 0.

Monthly drug spending

Answers to 4 questions were used to calculate the value for this outcome variable:

‘The number of days using illicit drugs monthly?’

‘List of the three drugs that you used the most frequently during the last 3 months?’

‘For each of the three drugs, how much money did you spend for one time of use?’

‘What was the frequency of use for each of the 3 drugs?’

The following formula was used to calculate the amount of monthly drug spending for each drug:

MonthlySpending = (NumberOfDaysUse*DrugDailyFrequency*AmountSpent) + (DrugWeeklyFrequency*4 (weeks)*AmountSpent) + (DrugMonthlyFrequency*AmountSpent)

The amount of monthly spending for all three drugs were added together and the value formed a continuous outcome variable.