The association between alcohol exposure and self-reported health status: The effect of separating former and current drinkers
Aims: To investigate the direction and degree of potential bias introduced to analyses of drinking and health status which exclude former drinkers from exposure groups. Design: Pooled analysis of 14 waves (1997–2010) of the U.S. National Health Interview Survey (NHIS). Setting: General population-ba...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Journal Article |
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Public Library of Science
2013
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/8523 |
| _version_ | 1848745683309297664 |
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| author | Liang, Wenbin Chikritzhs, Tanya |
| author_facet | Liang, Wenbin Chikritzhs, Tanya |
| author_sort | Liang, Wenbin |
| building | Curtin Institutional Repository |
| collection | Online Access |
| description | Aims: To investigate the direction and degree of potential bias introduced to analyses of drinking and health status which exclude former drinkers from exposure groups. Design: Pooled analysis of 14 waves (1997–2010) of the U.S. National Health Interview Survey (NHIS). Setting: General population-based study. Participants: 404,462 participants, from 14 waves of the NHIS, who had known self-reported health status and alcohol consumption status. Measurements: Self-reported health status was used as the indicator of health. Two approaches were used to classify alcohol consumption: (i) separation of former drinkers and current drinkers, and (ii) combined former and current drinkers. The prevalence of fair/ poor health by alcohol use, gender and age with 95% confidence intervals was estimated. The difference in prevalence of fair/ poor health status for lifetime abstainers, former drinkers, current drinkers and drinkers (former drinkers and current drinkers combined) were compared using Poisson regression with robust estimations of variance. Findings: Excluding former drinkers from drinker groups exaggerates the difference in health status between abstainers and drinkers, especially for males. Conclusions: In cohort study analyses, former drinkers should be assigned to a drinking category based on their previous alcohol consumption patterns and not treated as a discrete exposure group. |
| first_indexed | 2025-11-14T06:21:15Z |
| format | Journal Article |
| id | curtin-20.500.11937-8523 |
| institution | Curtin University Malaysia |
| institution_category | Local University |
| last_indexed | 2025-11-14T06:21:15Z |
| publishDate | 2013 |
| publisher | Public Library of Science |
| recordtype | eprints |
| repository_type | Digital Repository |
| spelling | curtin-20.500.11937-85232017-09-13T14:50:55Z The association between alcohol exposure and self-reported health status: The effect of separating former and current drinkers Liang, Wenbin Chikritzhs, Tanya Aims: To investigate the direction and degree of potential bias introduced to analyses of drinking and health status which exclude former drinkers from exposure groups. Design: Pooled analysis of 14 waves (1997–2010) of the U.S. National Health Interview Survey (NHIS). Setting: General population-based study. Participants: 404,462 participants, from 14 waves of the NHIS, who had known self-reported health status and alcohol consumption status. Measurements: Self-reported health status was used as the indicator of health. Two approaches were used to classify alcohol consumption: (i) separation of former drinkers and current drinkers, and (ii) combined former and current drinkers. The prevalence of fair/ poor health by alcohol use, gender and age with 95% confidence intervals was estimated. The difference in prevalence of fair/ poor health status for lifetime abstainers, former drinkers, current drinkers and drinkers (former drinkers and current drinkers combined) were compared using Poisson regression with robust estimations of variance. Findings: Excluding former drinkers from drinker groups exaggerates the difference in health status between abstainers and drinkers, especially for males. Conclusions: In cohort study analyses, former drinkers should be assigned to a drinking category based on their previous alcohol consumption patterns and not treated as a discrete exposure group. 2013 Journal Article http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/8523 10.1371/journal.pone.0055881 Public Library of Science fulltext |
| spellingShingle | Liang, Wenbin Chikritzhs, Tanya The association between alcohol exposure and self-reported health status: The effect of separating former and current drinkers |
| title | The association between alcohol exposure and self-reported health status: The effect of separating former and current drinkers |
| title_full | The association between alcohol exposure and self-reported health status: The effect of separating former and current drinkers |
| title_fullStr | The association between alcohol exposure and self-reported health status: The effect of separating former and current drinkers |
| title_full_unstemmed | The association between alcohol exposure and self-reported health status: The effect of separating former and current drinkers |
| title_short | The association between alcohol exposure and self-reported health status: The effect of separating former and current drinkers |
| title_sort | association between alcohol exposure and self-reported health status: the effect of separating former and current drinkers |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/8523 |