Iranian Journal of War and Public Health

  Introduction : Researches have shown that Disabled Veterans (DVs) are in exposure of drug abuse. Other researches have focused on the role of the type and severity on veterans' disability. Other studies have shown the relationships between dysfunctional coping and its negative concequences, too. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationships between coping ways, chronic stress symptoms and drug abuse among Qom's disabled veterans

  Methods & Materials : 452 DVs –with severity of disability from 25% to 70%- participated in this study. Participants selected by systematic categorical random sampling. Measures were Drug Abuse Screening Test (DAST), Addiction Severity Index (ASI), Brief COPE and Chronic Stress Symptoms Checklist (CSSC).

  Results : Linear multivariate regression analysis -stepwise method- executed and results showed chronic stress symptoms and some coping ways –substance use, behavior disengagement, humor and self-distraction- predicted drug abuse scores.

  MANOVA showed that physically disabled veterans less than others are afflicted by drug abuse. Multi-disability increases the rate of drug abuse. Psychological-chemical and psychological-chemical- physical disabled veterans showed more probability to suffer from drug abuse. Sever (55 and 60 percent) disabled veterans most likely affect by drug abuse.

  Discussion : It seems that disabled veterans need to help to modifying dysfunctional coping ways. Coping-therapy may be useful to help disabled veterans.