Alcohol a factor in up to a quarter of december emergency department presentations in hawke

The significant impact of alcohol on injury presentations to Emergency departments was presented to the Alcohol Advisory Council’s (ALAC) Working Together Conference in Wellington today.

During May 2008 and December 2008 all injury presentations (within 48 hours of injury) to the Hawke’s Bay Regional Hospital Emergency Department were assessed for the likelihood that alcohol had contributed to that injury.

Nurses in the department used an intoxication assessment checklist (based on the ALCO link used by NZ Police), asked about alcohol consumption and recorded details about the cause and location of the injury as well as the usual clinical injury details.

Dr Caroline McElnay, Director of Population Health at the Hawke’s Bay District Health Board told the conference December data showed that on average in 24.6 percent of injury presentations it was likely or highly likely that alcohol had contributed to the injury – this proportion varied with time and day of week reaching 64 percent of all injury presentations between midnight and 6am.

This compared with results from the May data showed that on average in 18.2 percent of injury presentations it was likely or highly likely that alcohol had contributed to the injury – this proportion varied with time and day of week reaching 67 percent of all injury presentations between midnight and 6am.

The data also showed the role of violence in alcohol-related injuries, she said. In May assaults accounted for 46 percent of all alcohol-related injuries followed by falls 20 percent and self harm 14 percent. In December assaults accounted for 33 percent of all alcohol-related injuries followed by falls 26 percent and self harm 8.7 percent.

Dr McElnay said the impact of alcohol-related injuries on workload was considerable.

``It’s not just the time taken to deal with alcohol-related injuries it is also the disruption caused to other patients who may have to take a back seat while we deal with those affected by alcohol. Effective ways of reducing alcohol-related injuries need to be implemented. Strategies to reduce ED waiting times should also examine the preventability of some presentations – alcohol-related injuries are a good example of preventable presentations.’’
Dr McElnay said the board would be looking at the potential for brief intervention work in an ED setting given that staff were encountering many examples of alcohol-related harm.