Five sessions of heavy drinking in three months flag risk: study
The team has calculated the thresholds for severe alcohol use disorder, which differ between men and women
Five or more heavy drinking days within a three-month period is a good rule of thumb to flag the risk of needing medical care for alcohol use disorder in the next year, researchers say.
The US team set out to find a threshold that might flag risky drinking in primary care.
After analysing health records for nearly 140,000 adults in a health insurance database, they found that the threshold differed between men and women and with age.
Heavy-drinking days were defined as four or more drinks per session for women and for men aged 65 or older, whereas for men younger than 64, heavy drinking was deemed to be five or more drinks on any one occasion.
