"Effectiveness of a Brief Intervention for Substances Consumption Linked to the Alcohol, Smoking and Substance Involvement Screening Test (ASSIST): A Randomized Control Trial in Chilean Primary Care."

Overview

Alcohol and drugs consumption are among the highest risk factor for health in Chile and abroad. In Chile, harmful use of alcohol continues to be a major contributor to the burden of disease while lost years of healthy life are higher than many other risk factors such as hypertension, overweight and obesity, and hyperglycemia. It is important to say that the impact of alcohol consumption is greater in younger age groups where fatal injuries occur relatively early in life, as well. In Chile, the consumption pattern in 2008 showed that 49.8 % consumed at least once in the last month for alcohol, 3.5 % for marihuana and 1.3 % for cocaine. This prevalence was even greater in young adults and adolescents and is associated with other mental health issues and poorer life quality. Those who have consumed marihuana during the last year, 25% report dependence symptoms. For cocaine derives, dependency rises up to 50% among the consumers. This data reinforce the need to design and implement strategies for reducing alcohol and drugs consumption in our population. Also, it is well known that a high number of those who suffers from any addiction problem do not get attention in a specialized center. The are many barriers to do so, such as lack of motivation, lack of resources, social problems, access to care problems, and so on. Chile has a shortage of preventive interventions for those at risk to develop an addiction at an early stage of substance use because front line health services (Primary health care and emergency care) and other social services (police stations, local justice courts) do not have a screening system and a model of brief intervention. The Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile, through its Addiction Studies Center (CEDA UC) and its Department of Family Medicine, is working in conjunction with SENDA (Servicio Nacional para la Prevención y Rehabilitación del Consumo de Drogas y Alcohol ) to design, implement and evaluate a communal system for early detection, brief intervention and referral to treatment (SBIRT), in people older than 18 years, with substance consumption in five municipalities in the country. The aid of this study is to demonstrate that a model of brief intervention is more effective than the approach currently used in patients with substance use at moderate risk (i.e.follow-up). It is a multicentric randomized controlled trial, single blind, with a group to receive brief intervention and a control group that is kept in control and waiting list being re-evaluated three months later. The target population is composed by users whose ASSIST screening scores place them in the moderate risk group, for which there has not been defined a structured intervention yet by our health system. The information will be obtained from the scores obtained after the application of the ASSIST-WHO questionnaire.