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Leveraging AI to predict substance use disorder treatment outcomes

Neuropsychopharmacology volume 49, pages 335–336 (2024)Cite this article

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The predominant challenge in the management of substance use disorders (SUD) lies in the frequent recurrence of use (relapse) and patient departure from treatment programs (dropout). These situations, more the rule than the exception, have been traditionally examined through comprehensive assessments of various factors we believe contribute to relapse, such as the severity of addiction, demographic elements, and life history [1]. Such factors are often assessed at treatment entry with structured interviews that are dependent on the patient’s retrospective self-reporting of a highly complex health condition.

We compared the predictive power of this social media language-based digital phenotype with that of the Addiction Severity Index [3], a widely used structured interview, to predict 90-day SUD treatment outcomes (a three-way classification task: abstinence, relapse, and dropout). Results showed that the digital phenotype outperformed the traditional interview method (AUC 0.725 vs. 0.658; Fig. 1B), via an out-of-sample cross-validation setup. This suggests that the digital phenotype, derived from patients’ social media language, could be a powerful tool for identifying patients at high risk for dropout at the beginning of treatment engagement.

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Fig. 1: Study design, Sample Demographics, and Results.

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Funding

This study was funded by the Intramural Research Program of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA; ZIA DA000628).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Intramural Research Program, National Institute on Drug Abuse, Baltimore, MD, USA

    Salvatore Giorgi & Brenda Curtis

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  1. Salvatore Giorgi
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  2. Brenda Curtis
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SG and BC wrote the manuscript and prepared the figures.

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Correspondence to Brenda Curtis.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Giorgi, S., Curtis, B. Leveraging AI to predict substance use disorder treatment outcomes. Neuropsychopharmacol. 49, 335–336 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41386-023-01700-6

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