Most people with AUD can and do recover, and their individual paths to recovery vary widely. By highlighting the likelihood of recovery, you may encourage more patients with AUD to accept treatment or to reduce their drinking with or without treatment.| www.niaaa.nih.gov
Show your patients a standard drink chart when asking about their alcohol consumption to encourage more accurate estimates. Drinks often contain more alcohol than people think, and patients often underestimate their consumption. Advise some patients not to drink at all, including those who are managing health conditions that can be worsened by alcohol, are taking medications that could interact with alcohol, are pregnant or planning to become pregnant, or are under age 21.| www.niaaa.nih.gov
Alcohol’s harmful effects on multiple organs and body systems contribute to more than 200 health conditions and more than 178,000 deaths in the U.S. each year, making alcohol one of the leading causes of preventable death. More than half of the deaths result from chronic heavy alcohol consumption while the remainder result from acute injuries sustained while intoxicated.| www.niaaa.nih.gov
Combining alcohol with certain medications, particularly those with sedative effects, can increase the risk of adverse events, including falls, driving accidents, and fatal overdoses.| www.niaaa.nih.gov
With a brief intervention, you can help patients who drink too much to cut back or quit alcohol use as needed.| www.niaaa.nih.gov
Searching for alcohol treatment can be overwhelming. The Navigator will help you focus your search to find higher quality treatment, which can increase the odds of success.| NIAAA Alcohol Treatment Navigator
For some patients, alcohol treatment referral may not be a single event but instead part of an ongoing process of engagement. You can help patients surmount barriers to following through on a treatment referral by countering the effects of stigma, conveying that treatment can be effective, and offering a range of choices for care.| www.niaaa.nih.gov
Alcohol use disorder (AUD) is defined by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) as “a problematic pattern of alcohol use leading to clinically significant impairment or distress,” and is diagnosed as mild, moderate, or severe based on the number of symptoms, out of a possible 11, in the past 12 months.| www.niaaa.nih.gov
Alcohol is dually reinforcing because it can both activate the brain’s reward processing system that mediates pleasure and reduce the activity of the brain’s systems that mediate negative emotional states such as stress, anxiety, and emotional pain. Repeated, excessive use of alcohol can lead to the development of addiction, which is associated with reduced reward function and increased activation of brain stress systems. The process of becoming addicted is thus accompanied by a shift in ...| www.niaaa.nih.gov