Study Finds Women At Greater Risk Of Harm By Alcoholism.

2001 APR 5 - (NewsRx.com & NewsRx.net) -- Women suffering from alcoholism show greater effects on their daily lives than do alcoholic men, according to a study presented at the First World Congress on Women and Mental Health, held in Berlin, Germany, March 27-31, 2001.

Women coping with alcoholism report greater problems with both physical and social functioning, more bodily pain, and poorer physical and mental health than men, according to data analyzed by University of Michigan professor Kyle L. Grazier and co-author Kathleen Bucholz at Washington University in a three-year, $2 million study funded by the U.S. National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. Grazier teaches in the U-M School of Public Health's Department of Health Management and Policy.

Grazier and Bucholz tracked more than 700 people initially interviewed as part of a larger U.S. National Institutes of Health study conducted in five American cities 20 years ago. They located three groups of respondents from the St. Louis, Missouri sample: those diagnosed as stably alcoholic, borderline alcoholic, and those unaffected by alcohol in the original study. They conducted three interviews and reviewed all medical records for care received over a two-year period. Grazier noted that their approach is unique because most research examines alcoholics in treatment centers where they're easiest to find, but they looked at individuals in the community, including a broad spectrum of alcoholics who have and have not received treatment.

"We don't know very much about people in the general community," Grazier said. There have been no other community-based longitudinal studies that have followed individuals for almost 20 years to examine the long-term health services effects of alcohol use and abuse.

Women considered stable alcoholics showed greater effects on their daily life, including simple activities like walking and shopping, than men in that group. Grazier and Bucholz are exploring reasons for the disparity, whether biological or social.

Those causes carry implications for the way physicians treat female patients and ways community-based programs educate people ...