Primary health care professionals' activity in intervening in patients' alcohol drinking during a 3-year brief...

The study examined the change of primary health care professionals' activity in asking patients about alcohol and giving advice to heavy drinkers during a 3-year brief intervention implementation project.

A patient questionnaire survey after consultation blind to the primary health care professionals before and after the implementation project. Brief intervention implementation was based on action research. Subjects were 1,000 consecutive 16-65-year-old patients consulting general practitioners at two primary health care centres at baseline and follow-up, of whom 655 and 768, respectively, participated.

No statistically significant differences were found regarding asking or advising about alcohol between baseline and 3-year follow-up. Of all patients, 19.1% (125/655) at baseline versus 19.7% (151/768) at follow-up were last asked about alcohol during the consultation in question or during past year (P=0.784). Likewise, of heavy drinkers, 30.9% (30/97) versus 33.9 (38/112) were asked (P=0.644). Of heavy drinkers, 13.4 (13/97) versus 14.9% (17/114) were advised about alcohol during the consultation in question (P=0.754).

The activity to do brief intervention remained stable. This may be due to the short follow-up time, the way brief intervention was implemented in the present study or the saturation in the activity reached already before the present study.