Alcohol and Drug Counselor Exam Practice Questions 2026 – Your Comprehensive All-in-One Guide to Exam Success!

The estimation of the percentage of homeless people with a substance or mental disorder is indeed difficult to accurately estimate due to various factors.

One significant reason for this challenge is the transient nature of homelessness itself, where individuals may move in and out of homelessness or may not seek services that would provide data on their mental health or substance use status. Furthermore, mental health and substance use issues can often go undiagnosed, complicating the ability to gather reliable statistics. Additionally, different studies may define and categorize homelessness, mental disorders, and substance use in various ways, leading to inconsistencies in the data collected. The lack of a centralized database or method for tracking these populations further hampers accurate estimations.

These complexities make it difficult to determine precise figures regarding the prevalence of substance use or mental health disorders among homeless individuals, emphasizing why accurate estimates remain challenging.