Participation dynamics of a cohort of drug users in a low-threshold methadone treatment programme

Table 3 Comparison between drug users who continued to receive methadone for more than 1 year and defaulters who discontinued treatment within 1 year (n = 345)

	Defaulters (n = 94)		Non-defaulters (n = 251)		Test
	No.	%	No.	%	OR	95 % CI	p value
	Median	IQR	Median	IQR	Mann-Whitney U		p value
Baseline socio-demographics
Male	70	75 %	193	77 %	0.88	0.51–1.52	0.64
Chinese	79	84 %	184	73 %	1.92	1.03–3.56	0.04*
HKID holder^a	52	55 %	210	84 %	0.24	0.14–0.41	<0.001*
Age (years)	35	28–41	34	28–39	11,105		0.40
Aged >35	43	46 %	102	41 %	1.23	0.76–1.99	0.73
Years of narcotic use	11	3–15	7	2–14	9878		0.02*
Connectivity patterns
Attended the nearest clinic^b	21	64 %	73	72 %	0.67	0.29–1.54	0.35
Same residing and clinic district^b	22	67 %	65	64 %	1.11	0.48–2.54	0.81
Distance (m) from home to frequent clinic^b	760	459–1836	498	223–1427	1311		0.07
Shortest distance (m) from home to clinic^b	520	271–881	443	216–749	1450		0.26
Connected in social network^c	28	30 %	137	55 %	0.35	0.21–0.59	<0.001*
Degree^d	0	0–1	1	0–4	8137		<0.001*
Betweenness centrality^e	0	0–0	0	0–42	9596		<0.001*

OR odds ratio; 95 % CI 95 % confidence interval, IQR interquartile range
*p < 0.05
^aHKID holder refers to a person who is permitted to stay in Hong Kong for more than 180 days excluding visitors
^bDefaulters n = 33, non-defaulters n = 101
^cUsers who have at least one connection with any other users with F-score not less than 0.1
^dThe number of connections with other users with F-score not less than 0.1
^eDefaulters n = 28, non-defaulters n = 137

ISSN: 1477-7517