[An epidemiological study of alcohol consumption habits in La Foz de Morcín (Asturias)]

To determine the prevalence of alcoholism in a rural area of Asturias and the correlation between this disease and several disorders, symptoms and clinical signs, as well as personal and social factors.

We conducted a cross-sectional descriptive study on a sample of 200 persons divided into two groups according to alcohol consumption, stating as limit for the classification of a person as hard-drinker, the consumption of 80 or more grams of ethanol/day in the case of men and 50 gr/day in the case of women, during at least 10 years. Through a specially designed survey and the data on physical explorations and blood biochemistry, the results in both groups were compared.

The prevalence of alcoholism in the area under study was 19.5%, with domination of males (12/1) and a mean age of 47.4 +/- 12.8 years, this being globally greater than the national average. The most sensitive analytical parameters a indicators of hard alcohol consumption were Hct, Hb, TGO, TGP, FA, bilirubin and gamma-GT. The main physical signs observed among the hard-drinkers were: malar telangiectasias, parathyroid hypertrophy, conjunctival jaundice and hepatomegaly. There were no significant differences between both groups with respect to mean age, marital status or labour activity. A greater prevalence of depressive-type psychiatric problems were observed in the group of hard-drinkers. In this group, there was also a greater proportion of traumatic antecedents, judicial-type problems and accidents, as well as a greater work absenteeism.

All these findings support the already known idea of the severity of the problem caused by excessive consumption of alcohol, both at the individual, public health and socio-economical level; as well as the usefulness of several hematological and hepatic biochemical parameters for its detection. The high prevalence of excessive alcohol consumption in this rural area of Asturias, its population being characterized by a great proportion of miners, has also been demonstrated.