Stress, Coping, and Context: Examining Substance Use Among LGBTQ Young Adults With Probable Substance Use Disorders

What is it about?

The large Canadian At Home/Chez Soi trial showed that Housing First, which provides homeless people with mental illness access to a subsidized apartment of their choice, together with clinical supports, significantly increases the amount of time people are able to spend in stable housing, Previous work has also shown that, for people whose needs were deemed moderate, Housing First cost about $56 per additional day of stable housing: it resulted in almost half of the cost of the intervention being offset by reductions in the costs of shelters and other services that homeless people use. This study extends the one just mentioned by providing results for people with higher needs, who received more intensive supports. Even though the intervention cost more, a greater proportion of its cost (about 69%) was offset by reductions in the costs of shelters and other services. As a result, the cost of an additional day of stable housing was about the same - $42. Both these costs are moderate in relation to the costs of many other housing services that are offered to people who are homeless. We still need to find out how many people should be offered Housing First for people with high needs compared to Housing First for people with moderate needs.

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