Brief Intervention Helps Emergency Patients Reduce Drinking
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH NIH News National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA)
Summary of Article (the full text can be found online at nih.gov) Asking emergency department patients about their alcohol use and talking with them about how to reduce harmful drinking patterns is an effective way to lower rates of risky drinking in these patients, according to a nationwide collaborative study supported by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). Emergency department patients who underwent a regimen of alcohol screening and brief intervention reported lower rates of risky drinking at three-month follow-up than did those who received only written information about reducing their drinking. A report of the study by the Academic Emergency Department Screening, Brief Intervention and Referral to Treatment (SBIRT) Research Collaborative* appears in the December, 2007 issue of the "Annals of Emergency Medicine".

The primary intervention consisted of a Brief Negotiated Interview (BNI) that emergency practitioners performed with each member of the intervention group. Patients in the intervention group also received a written handout explaining low-risk drinking and a referral list of alcohol treatment providers. Patients in the control group received only the low-risk drinking handout and referral list.

The brief intervention, BNI, a conversation between emergency care providers and patients that involves listening rather than telling, and guiding rather than directing, is designed to review the patient's current drinking patterns, assess their readiness to change, offer advice about the low-risk guidelines and the next steps to pursue, and negotiate a written prescription for change or a drinking agreement with the patient," explains co-author Edward Bernstein, M.D., professor and vice chair for academic affairs in the department of emergency medicine at Boston University School of Medicine. Dr. Bernstein, who coordinated the training of emergency department personnel in the study, notes that the interview typically takes less than 10 minutes to complete.

Clinical guidance for rapid screening, assessment and management of at-risk drinking and alcohol use disorders is outlined in NIAAA's "Helping Patients Who Drink Too Much: A Clinician's Guide", available on the Web at: nih.gov