Anxiety disorders, comorbid substance abuse, and benzodiazepine discontinuation: implications for treatment.

Comorbidity among various disorders complicates research and practice. Comorbidity among emotional disorders and substance use disorders is a particularly thorny problem due to the dearth of relevant clinical research. This chapter reviews what is known about the comorbidity of substance use and anxiety disorders and presents recent data collected in the context of comorbid anxiety and mood disorders that may have implications for the relationship of anxiety and substance use disorders. The specific case of the relationship of benzodiazepine use to successful outcome of psychosocial treatments and recent developments in successful psychosocial strategies for discontinuing benzodiazepines in anxious patients may provide important information for future studies. This chapter begins with a brief review of data on the co-occurrence of substance use and anxiety disorders.