MEDIA RELEASE
ALCOHOL ADVISORY COUNCIL
For immediate use
Thursday 10 April
11:50am
Alcohol-related admissions may be much higher than previously thought
Alcohol-related admissions of the under-20s to accident and emergency departments could be six times higher than past
research has indicated. This was the message from emergency medicine specialist Paul Quigley to the Alcohol and Advisory
Council (ALAC) conference in Nelson today.
Dr Quigley, from Wellington Hospital, told the conference that accident and emergency data from the past four years
which showed the primary cause of an admission as “alcohol” shows a static and not very large number of admissions.
“If research looks at people admitted primarily because of alcohol – and we are talking here, for example, about someone
passing out in a street somewhere – there appears to be a level and relatively small number of cases over the last four
years. But our clinical staff know there has been a significant increase in the number of alcohol-related admissions.”
“So we looked at data which was coded ‘alcohol’ as the primary cause of the admission, but also included a secondary
cause of ‘injuries related to alcohol’.”
Dr Quigley said that resulted in a “six fold blowout” of the alcohol-only figures.
“This means past research could have grossly underestimated how often alcohol is related to emergency admissions.”
Paul Quigley told the conference that the alcohol-only data also shows a steady increase in the number of females being
brought in, particularly 14 and 15 year olds. “The common perception is that being ‘smashed’ is a male dominated
activity, but we are now seeing more young women than men presenting with severe intoxication. If the trend keeps going
women will hit 60 percent of drunk presentations this year.
“The really disturbing thing is that emergency departments see only the tip of the iceberg. You have to be really bad to
be admitted to an emergency department, so what does that say about the numbers of drunk under-18 year old girls
staggering along the streets of Wellington?”
Once data includes alcohol-related injuries, males begin to dominate admissions again, particularly with ‘fighting
injuries’: concussion, facial injuries and fractured hands. But there’s an increasing number of women being admitted
with similar injuries.
“It used to be that women had a much higher rate of admissions as a result of mental health issues related to alcohol,
for instance, attempting suicide during a binge session. The proportion of those types of admissions has changed lately
as the number of women’s ‘fighting injuries’ increases.
“The really scary thing is that there are girls, some as young as 14, who are repeatedly admitted for injuries caused by
alcohol. What does that say about their lives and our communities down the track a few years?”
Dr Quigley is calling for improved awareness in emergency departments across the country of the association between
weekend injuries and episodes of binge drinking, especially in the under-18 year olds.
“There have been some very good studies done on how easy it is to alter harmful alcohol-related behaviour, just by
pointing it out to the patient. The problem is we don't always think about the cause of minor injuries.
“We also need to study the ‘consumer’ patterns of drinking. At Wellington Hospital we are going to begin a study that
establishes where the drinker comes from, where they got the booze and where they passed out. This type of information
could then be used to find problem areas and enable law enforcement and liquor authorities to be more focused on
preventing harm.
“Apart from all the other disturbing features of youth drinking problems, every Sunday my staff are filling out ACC
forms with patients unable to work for days. I hate to think of the cost to the country of such hazardous drinking”,
said Dr Quigley.
ends