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Unintended consequences : Alcohol screening at urban Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Services was suppressed during COVID-19 lockdowns
Conigrave, James Devine, Emma K. Lee, K. S. Kylie Dobbins, Timothy Vnuk, Julia Hayman, Noel Conigrave, Kate
Conigrave, James
Devine, Emma K.
Lee, K. S. Kylie
Dobbins, Timothy
Vnuk, Julia
Hayman, Noel
Conigrave, Kate
Abstract
Introduction: Regular screening for risky drinking is important to improve the health of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians. We explored whether the rate of screening for risky drinking using the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test—Consumption (AUDIT-C) questions was disrupted at Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Services (ACCHS) during state-wide and territory-wide COVID-19 lockdowns in 2020.
Methods: Retrospective analysis of screening data from 22 ACCHSs located in New South Wales, the Northern Territory, Queensland, South Australia, Victoria and Western Australia. These services provide holistic and culturally appropriate primary care. A multi-level Poisson regression, including AR(1) autocorrelation, was used to predict counts of AUDIT-C screening at ACCHSs.
Results: AUDIT-C screening was suppressed during state-wide and territory-wide lockdowns in 2020 (incident rate ratio [IRR] 0.42 [0.29, 0.61]). The effect of lockdowns differed by service remoteness. While there was a substantial reduction in AUDIT-C screening for urban and inner regional services (IRR 0.25 [95% confidence interval (CI) 0.15, 0.42]), there was not a statistically significant change in screening at outer regional and remote (IRR 0.60 [95% CI 0.33, 1.09]) or very remote services (IRR 0.67 [95% CI 0.40, 1.11]).
Discussion and Conclusions: The COVID-19 lockdowns in Australia likely suppressed rates of screening for risky drinking in urban and inner regional regions. As harm from alcohol consumption may have increased during lockdowns, policymakers should consider implementing measures to enable screening for risky drinking to continue during future lockdowns.
Keywords
ACCHSs, alcohol screening, AUDIT-C, COVID-19, pandemic, indigenous Australians
Date
2023
Type
Journal article
Journal
Book
Volume
42
Issue
7
Page Range
1633-1638
Article Number
ACU Department
Institute for Positive Psychology and Education
Faculty of Education and Arts
Faculty of Education and Arts
Relation URI
Event URL
Open Access Status
Published as ‘gold’ (paid) open access
License
CC BY 4.0
File Access
Open
Notes
National Health and Medical Research Council. Grant Numbers: 1105339, 1117198, 1117582
© 2023 The Authors. Drug and Alcohol Review published by John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd on behalf of Australasian Professional Society on Alcohol and other Drugs.
This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
© 2023 The Authors. Drug and Alcohol Review published by John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd on behalf of Australasian Professional Society on Alcohol and other Drugs.
This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/