Effects of an Integrated Alcohol-Drinking Intervention Program for Family Members of Hazardous-Drinker Patients

Excessive alcohol use has been associated with a large variety of health, social, and legal problems. Since problems with alcohol consumption accumulate gradually, hazardous or harmful drinkers should be detected early to establish timely and appropriate interventions. Family members of hazardous or harmful drinkers suffer many negative effects, highlighting the importance of screening and intervening for problem drinking in family members of patients identified as problem drinkers. Existing studies on alcohol drinking-related problems mainly focus on patients, and few studies have focused on their family members either in western countries or in Taiwan. No intervention program is available to address the drinking behaviors among family members of hazardous-drinker patients. Since some assessment tools are not available, we plan to develop appropriate questionnaires. Then we will develop an integrated intervention and examine its clinical effects. This proposed 3-year study will include three stages. In Stage I, we will develop and validate three scales for family members of hazardous-drinker patients: 1) a knowledge scale related to alcohol drinking, 2) a needs scale related to living with a hazardous-drinker patient and 3) a needs scale related to abstaining from alcohol drinking. In Stage II, we will develop an integrated alcohol drinking-intervention program for family members of hazardous-drinker patients and examine the feasibility of this newly developed drinking-intervention program. In Stage III, we will use the results of Stage II to revise the integrated alcohol-drinking intervention program for family members of hazardous-drinker patients and conduct a study to evaluate the effects of this new program at 1, 3, and 6 months after the intervention. The study results will demonstrate the effects of an integrated alcohol-drinking intervention program for family members of hazardous-drinker patients on family members' alcohol drinking, their mental health, and patients' alcohol drinking. The program may be used in clinical settings to help other family members of hazardous-drinker patients.

Project ID:PC10907-0889
External Project ID:MOST109-2314-B182-062-MY3