Alcohol Screening & Brief Interventions in a Policing Context.

A Feasibility Study

Nicola Brown

Dorothy Newbury-Birch

Eileen Kaner

Background 23% of the adult population, or 7.1 million people, in

England drink alcohol in a hazardous or harmful way

60-65% prevalence in CJS settings

Total cost of alcohol-related crime in England & Wales is £7.3 billion

Alcohol and Crime 40% of Binge Drinkers admitted

committing a crime in past 12 months (Budd 2003)

Binge drinkers 5 times more likely to be involved in a fight in previous 12 months (Richardson and Budd 2003)

Victim, offender or both had been drinking in previous 4 hours in 90% of assaults (Finney 2004)

Alcohol is consumed before 73% of domestic violence cases (Gilchrist 2003)

Up to 25% of current Police work is associated with alcohol related incidents (Palk 2007)

Aim To explore the feasibility of providing alcohol SBI in the Police

setting

To survey the number of detainees that can be screened for alcohol use within a given time frame in a Police station

To determine the number & proportion of hazardous/ harmful drinkers that are willing to engage in BA

To establish the training needs of Detention Officers for conducting alcohol SBI

Design

£10K funding £5K South Tyneside DAAT £5K South Tyneside PCT

3 months data collection May to July 2009

Process

South Shields Police Station Carried out by 10 detention officers During finger printing just prior to release Inclusion criteria

Arrested for a public order offence or any assault offence (excluding attempted murder or murder)

Aged 18 or over Alert and orientated Able to speak, read and write English sufficiently well

to comprehend the intervention

Data Collection

Participants characteristicsAge, gender, occupation, ethnicity

Arrest DetailsReason for arrest, time, day

Audit Score - 10 questions BA delivery & explanation if not

Findings

229 participants involved

From a possible 634 target arrests (36%) 80% Male 92% White British 52% Unemployed 63% data collected on weekends

Age and screening outcome of the 229 participants

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

Under 20 21-30 31-40 41-50 51-60 61+ Missing

No

. o

f p

art

icip

an

ts

Positive Negative Missing

Arrest Classifications

Expanded as some DO’s included

people outside of the remit Assault – 50% Public Order – 40% Other – Drug possession, sexual offences,

child neglect, arson etc – 10%

Screening Outcome for all 229 participants

Refused or unable to take part23%

Positive58%

Negative19%

For the 172 participants who completed a questionnaire 132 (75%) had an AUD

Breakdown of Positive Screening Outcome (AUDs)

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

Increased Risk / Hazardous Level High Risk/ Harmful Level Possible Dependancy

No

. of

pa

rtic

pa

nts

50% 14% 36%

AUDIT Question 3. How often do you have 6 or more standard drinks on one occasion?

Never11%

Less than monthly13%

Monthly22%Weekly

33%

Daily/ Almost daily19%

Missing2%

AUDIT Question 9. Have you or somebody else been injured as a result of your drinking?

No – 86 (49%)

Yes, but not in the last 6 months – 15 (9%)

Yes during the last 6 months – 71 (40%)

Missing – 4 (2%)

Further analysis

Possibilities to analyse each AUDIT questions and cross-match for certain demographic characteristics

Qualitative interviews with the

Detention Officers involved

Limitations

One North East Police Station

3 month data collection

Representative sample

Future Work

Total arrest for 3 months was >2000 Exploring the DO views may give an

insight into; acceptability & feasibility possible new ways of working future research possibilities

Conclusions

229 of 634 (36%) of all target arrests were screened for alcohol consumption

176 of 634 (28%) completed the AUDIT

126 of the 133 (95%) who screened positive were willing to engage in BA

Thank you

Any questions?