title: The effectiveness of routine screening questions in the detection of alcoholism.
abstract: To assess the prevalence of alcoholism in an ambulatory medical clinic and to determine the effectiveness of screening questions for alcoholism, 232 new patients in a medical primary care unit were interviewed using a questionnaire that included the Michigan Alcoholism Screening Test (MAST). Based on MAST scores, 47 of 232 subjects were designated as alcoholics, yielding a prevalence of alcoholism of 20.3%. Sensitivities and specificities for alcohol-use questions were calculated using the MAST diagnosis of alcoholism. The questions "How much do you drink?" and "How often do you drink?" yielded low sensitivities of 34.0% and 46.8%, respectively. The question "Have you ever had a drinking problem?" considered alone had a high sensitivity of 70.2%; when combined with "When was your last drink?" this question had a sensitivity of 91.5%. We recommend the routine incorporation of these last two questions into the medical history in light of the high prevalence of alcoholism in this outpatient population.
authors.affiliation: Division of General Internal Medicine, Rhode Island Hospital, Providence 02902.
authors.forename: M G
authors.initials: MG
authors.lastname: Cyr
authors.forename: S A
authors.initials: SA
authors.lastname: Wartman
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000437:Alcoholism / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007407:Interviews as Topic; D008297:Male; D008403:Mass Screening / Q000379:methods*; D008487:Medical History Taking; D008875:Middle Aged; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires