Characteristics of persons with severe mental illness and substance abuse in rural areas.

A cross-sectional study of 1,551 clients receiving care in ten community-based rural mental health care systems assessed problem behaviors and psychiatric symptoms among three groups of severely mentally ill clients: those with a current substance abuse problem, those with a history of substance abuse but no current problem, and those with no history of substance abuse problems. Clients with a current substance abuse problem were younger than clients who had no history of such problems and had more symptoms of anger, more trouble with the law, and more suicidal threats than clients in the other two groups.