Conducting economic evaluations of screening and brief intervention for hazardous drinking: Methods and evidence to date for informing policy.
OBJECTIVE
Many policy review articles have concluded that alcohol screening and brief intervention (SBI) is both cost-effective and cost-beneficial. Yet a recent cost-effectiveness review for the United Kingdom's National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence suggests that these conclusions may be premature.


METHODS
This article offers a brief synopsis of the various types of economic analyses that may be applied to SBI, including cost analysis, cost-effectiveness analysis, cost-utility analysis, cost-benefit analysis and other types of economic evaluation. A brief overview of methodological issues is provided, and examples from the SBI evaluation literature are provided.
The current evidence base is insufficient to draw firm conclusions about the cost, cost-effectiveness or cost-benefit of SBI and about the impact of SBI on health-care utilisation.[Cowell AJ, Bray JW, Mills MJ, Hinde JM. Conducting economic evaluations of screening and brief intervention for hazardous drinking: Methods and evidence to date for informing policy.
RTI International, Research Triangle Park, NC 27709, USA. cowell@rti.org
Alexander J
AJ
Cowell
Jeremy W
JW
Bray
Michael J
MJ
Mills
Jesse M
JM
Hinde
D000428:Alcohol Drinking; D000437:Alcoholism / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000517:prevention & control*; D003362:Cost-Benefit Analysis; D003376:Counseling / Q000191:economics*; D006291:Health Policy; D006801:Humans; D008403:Mass Screening; D011320:Primary Health Care