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Drinking patterns, dependency and lifetime drinking history in alcohol related liver disease

Drinking patterns, dependency and lifetime drinking history in alcohol related liver disease
Drinking patterns, dependency and lifetime drinking history in alcohol related liver disease
AIMS: To examine the hypothesis that increases in UK liver deaths are a result of episodic or binge drinking as opposed to regular harmful drinking. DESIGN: A prospective survey of consecutive in-patients and out-patients. SETTING: The liver unit of a teaching hospital in the South of England. PARTICIPANTS: A total of 234 consecutive in-patients and out-patients between October 2007 and March 2008. MEASUREMENTS: Face-to-face interviews, Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test, 7-day drinking diary, Severity of Alcohol Dependence Questionnaire, Lifetime Drinking History and liver assessment. FINDINGS: Of the 234 subjects, 106 had alcohol as a major contributing factor (alcoholic liver disease: ALD), 80 of whom had evidence of cirrhosis or progressive fibrosis. Of these subjects, 57 (71%) drank on a daily basis; only 10 subjects (13%) drank on fewer than 4 days of the week--of these, five had stopped drinking recently and four had cut down. In ALD patients two life-time drinking patterns accounted for 82% of subjects, increasing from youth (51%), and a variable drinking pattern (31%). ALD patients had significantly more drinking days and units/drinking day than non-ALD patients from the age of 20 years onwards. CONCLUSIONS: Increases in UK liver deaths are a result of daily or near-daily heavy drinking, not episodic or binge drinking, and this regular drinking pattern is often discernable at an early age.
0965-2140
587-592
Hatton, Jennifer
89116afb-0ab8-43e6-adea-77ff7234c438
Burton, Andrew
af718b29-3d32-417b-a0df-4f64aeb3febd
Nash, Harriet
17f5a92a-7f6b-4a6d-aafb-b046a85c5123
Munn, Emma
934fdc5c-c548-4268-9318-6fcd9d431044
Burgoyne, Lesley
6204134c-6867-41dd-9102-9f22ec9b60c8
Sheron, Nick
cbf852e3-cfaa-43b2-ab99-a954d96069f1
Hatton, Jennifer
89116afb-0ab8-43e6-adea-77ff7234c438
Burton, Andrew
af718b29-3d32-417b-a0df-4f64aeb3febd
Nash, Harriet
17f5a92a-7f6b-4a6d-aafb-b046a85c5123
Munn, Emma
934fdc5c-c548-4268-9318-6fcd9d431044
Burgoyne, Lesley
6204134c-6867-41dd-9102-9f22ec9b60c8
Sheron, Nick
cbf852e3-cfaa-43b2-ab99-a954d96069f1

Hatton, Jennifer, Burton, Andrew, Nash, Harriet, Munn, Emma, Burgoyne, Lesley and Sheron, Nick (2009) Drinking patterns, dependency and lifetime drinking history in alcohol related liver disease. Addiction, 104 (4), 587-592. (doi:10.1111/j.1360-0443.2008.02493.x). (PMID:19215600)

Record type: Article

Abstract

AIMS: To examine the hypothesis that increases in UK liver deaths are a result of episodic or binge drinking as opposed to regular harmful drinking. DESIGN: A prospective survey of consecutive in-patients and out-patients. SETTING: The liver unit of a teaching hospital in the South of England. PARTICIPANTS: A total of 234 consecutive in-patients and out-patients between October 2007 and March 2008. MEASUREMENTS: Face-to-face interviews, Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test, 7-day drinking diary, Severity of Alcohol Dependence Questionnaire, Lifetime Drinking History and liver assessment. FINDINGS: Of the 234 subjects, 106 had alcohol as a major contributing factor (alcoholic liver disease: ALD), 80 of whom had evidence of cirrhosis or progressive fibrosis. Of these subjects, 57 (71%) drank on a daily basis; only 10 subjects (13%) drank on fewer than 4 days of the week--of these, five had stopped drinking recently and four had cut down. In ALD patients two life-time drinking patterns accounted for 82% of subjects, increasing from youth (51%), and a variable drinking pattern (31%). ALD patients had significantly more drinking days and units/drinking day than non-ALD patients from the age of 20 years onwards. CONCLUSIONS: Increases in UK liver deaths are a result of daily or near-daily heavy drinking, not episodic or binge drinking, and this regular drinking pattern is often discernable at an early age.

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Published date: April 2009

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 72580
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/72580
ISSN: 0965-2140
PURE UUID: 8f84648b-a094-41c4-8e2b-c978cc61e9b5
ORCID for Nick Sheron: ORCID iD orcid.org/0000-0001-5232-8292

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Date deposited: 18 Feb 2010
Last modified: 13 Mar 2024 21:33

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Contributors

Author: Jennifer Hatton
Author: Andrew Burton
Author: Harriet Nash
Author: Emma Munn
Author: Lesley Burgoyne
Author: Nick Sheron ORCID iD

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