Psychotic disorders hospitalizations associated with cannabis abuse or dependence: A nationwide big data analysis

OBJECTIVES: We aimed to describe and correlate the hospital panorama of psychotic disorders (PD) with cannabis use (CU) trends in all Portuguese public hospitals. METHODS: We conducted a retrospective observational study that analysed all hospitalizations that occurred in Portuguese public hospitals from 2000 to 2015. Hospitalizations with a primary diagnosis of PD or schizophrenia were selected based on Clinical Classification Software diagnostic single‐level 659. Episodes associated with CU were identified by the International Classification of Diseases Version 9, Clinical Modification code 304.3/305.2 that correspond to cannabis dependence/cannabis abuse. RESULTS: The number of hospitalizations with a primary diagnosis of PD and schizophrenia associated with CU rose 29.4 times during the study period, from 20 to 588 hospitalizations yearly (2000 and 2015, respectively) with a total of 3,233 hospitalizations and an average episode cost of €3,500. Male patients represented 89.8% of all episodes, and the mean/median age at discharge were 30.66/29.00 years, respectively. From all hospitalizations with a primary diagnosis of PD or schizophrenia, the ones with a secondary diagnosis of CU rose from 0.87% in 2000 to 10.60% in 2015. CONCLUSIONS: The increase on secondary diagnosis coding and the change on cannabis patterns of consumption in Portuguese population with an increasing frequency of moderate/high dosage cannabis consumers may explain the rise on PD hospitalizations.