Outcomes and other study variables
illness, adversities, traumatic, substance-related, psychiatric
EVENTS, SEPARATION, EMERGENCY
We describe in this section the outcome variables and any other scales used in this analysis. Stable housing was defined as “living in one’s own room, apartment, or house, or with family, with an expected duration of residence of 6 months or more or tenancy rights” while enrolled in the study, taking into account participants’ move in/out dates for each type of residence (e.g., street place, unstable residence, stable residence, institution) [The other outcomes were assessed via in-person interviews at baseline, 6-, 12-, 18, and 24 months post-enrollment.The Lehman Quality of Life Interview 20 (QoLI-20) measured participants’ condition-specific quality of life. Twenty items scored on a 7-point Likert scale define a total quality of life and domains of family, finance, leisure, living, safety, social, and overall quality of life. In this work, we used the total score calculated as the sum of all 20 items, which ranges from 20 to 140, with higher scores indicating better quality of life [Community functioning was measured using the Multnomah Community Ability Scale (MCAS), a 17-item scale capturing total community functioning and degree of clinician/observer-rated functional ability in domains of health, adaptation, social skills, and behavior. In this work, we used the total score calculated as the sum of all 17 times, ranging from 17–85, with higher scores indicating less impairment [The Colorado Symptom Index (CSI) assessed how often specific psychiatric symptoms were experienced, from ‘at least every day’ to ‘not at all’. Fourteen self-report items were summed (range 14 to 40), with lower scores reflecting fewer symptoms [Emergency department (ED) visits were measured using self-reported counts in the past 6 months. The number of past-month substance-related problems were measured via the 5-item Global Assessment of Individual Needs Short Screener (GAIN-SS); higher counts correspond to greater problem severity [The Community Integration Scale (CIS) measured self-reported psychological integration with the immediate community on a scale from 4–20; physical integration used counts of previous month social activities (e.g., attending a concert, meeting people for coffee) on a scale of 0–7. Higher scores on both reflect greater integration [Baseline and predictor variables included data collected on traumatic events that occurred before the age of 18 years using the Adverse Childhood Experiences module assessing ten early childhood adversities (yes/no items): emotional, physical or sexual abuse; emotional or physical neglect; household substance use, household mental illness and household criminal justice involvement; mother treated violently, and parental separation or divorce [