A Review of Psychologically Oriented Treatment of Alcoholism II. The Relative Effectiveness of Different Treatment

Perspectives in clinical research: relative effectiveness of alcohol abuse treatment.

In an effort to compare the effectiveness of 2 approaches to the treatment of patients with chronic alcoholism a randomized clinical trial was set up. Cases admitted to a unit for the treatment of chronic alcoholism entered the trial if they lived within 24 kilometers of the hospital were living as a member of 1 of a number of previously defined social groups and had not been in the unit in the previous 2 years. All suitable patients were interviewed within 3 days of admission by the research social worker using a schedule which included the patients version of his or her personal history the history of the drinking problem its magnitude and effects and the patients view of how the situation might be improved. If the patients agreed their families were visited and a similar schedule completed. The patients were randomly allocated to either the "intensive" or the "traditional" approach. Intake interviews before randomization revealed no important differences between the group that received the intensive social therapy and the remainder. Generally the assessments of the social worker and the independent assessor were similar. The study demonstrated that the randomized clinical trial can be used in evaluating social work and worked to modify the views of many about the benefits of the collaborative approach to social therapy. The studys most important conclusion is that attempts to measure the effectiveness of social work by randomized clinical trials are feasible.

https://jech.bmj.com/content/jech/26/1/57.3.full.pdf

W E Waters

Papers

Evaluation of social therapy in chronic alcoholism.