Citation

Taylor B, Irving HM, Kanteres F, Room RGW, Borges GLG, Cherpitel C, Greenfield T, Rehm JT. Drug Alcohol Depend. 2010; 110(1-2): 108-116.

Affiliation

Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Toronto, Ontario M5S2S1, Canada; Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto, Toronto M5T3M7, Canada; WHO Collaborating Centre for Substance Abuse, Zurich 8005, Switzerland.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2010, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.drugalcdep.2010.02.011

PMID

20236774

PMCID

PMC2887748

Abstract

Alcohol consumption causes injury in a dose-response manner. The most common mode of sustaining an alcohol-attributable injury is from a single occasion of acute alcohol consumption, but much of the injury literature employs usual consumption habits to assess risk instead. An analysis of the acute dose-response relationship between alcohol and injury is warranted to generate single occasion- and dose-specific relative risks. A systematic literature review and meta-analysis was conducted to fill this gap. Linear and best-fit first-order model were used to model the data. Usual tests of heterogeneity and publication bias were run. Separate meta-analyses were run for motor vehicle and non-motor vehicle injuries, as well as case-control and case-crossover studies. The risk of injury increases non-linearly with increasing alcohol consumption. For motor vehicle accidents, the odds ratio increases by 1.24 (95% CI: 1.18-1.31) per 10-g in pure alcohol increase to 52.0 (95% CI: 34.50-78.28) at 120g. For non-motor vehicle injury, the OR increases by 1.30 (95% CI: 1.26-1.34) to an OR of 24.2 at 140g (95% CI: 16.2-36.2). Case-crossover studies of non-MVA injury result in overall higher risks than case-control studies and the per-drink increase in odds of injury was highest for intentional injury, at 1.38 (95% CI: 1.22-1.55). Efforts to reduce drinking both on an individual level and a population level are important. No level of consumption is safe when driving and less than 2 drinks per occasion should be encouraged to reduce the risk of injury.

Language: en